IGflGO TO HE LABOUR WAR IN AMERICA. W. T. STEAD. PRICE ONE SHILLING. : "REVIEW OF REVIEWS" i"BORDEl^liA|viD" A QUARTERLY MAGAZINE DKVOTED TO T!(K 'y sttnitf of the I*h€nonuiH( of tin Miisti'ilout^ Borderland between Scirurr anff Stfjfwrstition . The first number of IJotthrtfntff appeared July 15, iSOy and 18 now out of print. The second, third, fourth, and fifth numbers can be supplied to order. Among the articles whioh have appeared in this Quarterly Joumal of Psychical Invest?- ' ' I * are out of prini :M;im 'I'. Slc'iul. -The {;■: KxperliHcnts, — Spirit I'i. vld. / 'in 1,1,1111 nil li..■.! ^..i PubiishcU January lb, April 15. July 13, October 15. CHARACTER SKETCHES, BY W. T. STEAD. IJeing a revised reprint of some of the Best Character Sketches that have appeared in the «■ REVIEW OP REVIEWS," with I numerous Illustrations. Should be in every Public Libra'rv. nn.) f m every Journalist's Bookshelves. Price HALF-A-CROWN, Large Quarto, Cloth; A HANDSOMER EDITION for Presentation P--- FIVE SHILLINGS. OM>0^'; "EEVIEW (-1' i;i.\li:\v CHICAGO TO-DAY. THE WORKING .MAN AND HIS VAMPIRE. (BCT IS THE VAMPIRS KIQHTLY LABELLED?) [From a design by Herr Otto Marcus, reproduced from " Der Wahrer Jacob.") CHICAGO TO-DAY OR, THE LABOUR WAR IN AMERICA. W. T. STEAD. Then I looked back along his path, And heard the clash of steel on steel, Where mun faced man in deadly wraih, While clanged the tocsin's hurrying peal. The sky with burning towns flared red, Nearer the noise of fighting rolled, And brothers' blood by Ijroihers shed. Crept curdling over pavements cold. I shouted, but he would not hear. Made signs, but these he couM not see, And still without a doubt or fear Broadcast he scattered Anarchy. The Sower of the Old World in the New. LOWTILL. LONDON: "EEVIEW OF EEVIEWS" OFFICE. 1894. LOJfDON: TEINTED BY WILLIAM CLOAVES AND SONS, Limited, STAJIFOKD STRBET AND CHARING CROSS. PREFACE. The recent terrible outburst of industrial war in the United States of America leads me to issue this brief and rapid survey of the events which have occurred this summer at Chicago. During my sojourn last winter in that great city, I had the opportunity of making the personal acquaintance of most of those who are leading the forces on either side, and since my return to London I have neglected no opportunity of keeping myself informed of the way in which things were going. In this volume I have endeavoured to piece together several more or less fragmentary studies of the labour move- ment and the problems which it raises in America to-day. Three of the chapters have appeared respectively in the Contemporary Review, the New Review, and the Review of Reviews, but the bulk of the work is now printed for the first time. I hope I may be excused for reproducing some passages from my earlier book, "If Christ came to Chicago ?" They are very brief, and they are necessary to the due presentation of the case. With that exception this book covers new ground, and may be said to be in some sense as a sequel up to date of the other volume. All who are interested in the evolution of modern society from the competitive to the co-operative stage in human vl ' Preface. progress will find the story of this Labour War full of intense interest, both for its cruel pathos and its ominous suggestions. The outbreak, although violent, was by no means unexpected. I wrote on leaving Chicago in March : — "I have had some little experience of agitatioa iu the Old World, and I must say that I have never seen a coidition of things ia an English-speaking land where the sigas point so unmistakably to change, and it may |be to violent changa. . . . There is ample need for the advent of a Peter the Hermit if the social crisis in America is not to culminate in bloodshed. The working people without allies have given no hostages to fortune, and have no visible reason for refraining from violence. It is true that violence will injure them in the long run far more than it can help them : but like all men who suffer and who are weak, they think more of the immediate winning of a strike by knocking a few ' scabs ' on the head than of the permanent loss which such violence inflicts upon their cause. If they had been within the pale they would long ere this have emerged from the stage of incipient Thuggee in which many of them dwell." " A stage of incipient Thuggee " seemed rather a hard phrase to apply, but unfortunately subsequent events show that it was only too well justified. W. T. STEAD. London, July Wth, 1894. CONTENTS. Frontispiece : — The Working Man and His Vampire. PAGE Preface ......... v Part I. — The PiIddle of the Sphinx, CHAP. I. THE CRY OP THE UNEMPLOYED .... 3 With Portrait of " General " Coxey. XL THE PETITION IN BOOTS . . . . .21 With Map, Portraits, and Illustrations. III. THE HIGGLING OP THE MARKET — AMERICAN FASHION . 71 Part II.— Just befoee the Battle. I. THE SEAT OP WAR ...... 87 With Map of Chicago. II. THE MILLIONAIRE AND HIS MODEL TOWN . . .113 With Portrait and Views of Pullman. III. LABOUR AND ITS LEADERS . . . . ,127 With'Portraits of Gompers, Debs, &c. viii Co7itents. Part III.— War. : CHAP. PAGB I. A PROPHET OP THE SOCIAL REVOLUTION . . .155 II. THE STRIKE AT PULLMAN ..... 170 III. THE ACHILLES' HEEL OP CIVILISATION . . .194 Part IV. — Defeat. I. THE KEEPERS OP LAW AND ORDER .... 210 II. HOW THE CONFLICT WAS FOUGHT OUT . . . 232 III. A STORMY OUTLOOK . . . , . .261 Appendix. PRESS NOTICES OP " IP CHRIST CAME TO CHICAGO " . . 275 MR. J. S. COXEY, Freisdent of the "J. S. Coxeij Good Roads Assocmilon of United iStates OHrCAGO TO-DAY; OR, THE LABOUR WAR IN AMERICA. PART L The Riddle of the Sphinx. Chapter I. — The Cry of the Unemployed. The First Armoury in Chicago was last year the scene of a fatal fire. It is a massive fortress of brown stone, standing in Michigan Avenue within gunshot of the Millionaire's Row, a grim and burly warder behind whose shadow Messrs. Pullman, Armour, and Field can sleep in peace. When I was in Chicago it was an empty ruin. The interior was heaped with ashes and de'bris. The fire-scarred ruins which were still stand- ing testified to the fierceness of the flames which had raged as in a furnace within the four walls of the Armoury. When the fire broke out it was at night, after the massive sallyport had been securely locked, and the inmates — two or three coloured men em- ployed as janitors — had gone to sleep. No sooner had the alarm been given than the fire-engines were on the spot, only to discover that all access to the massive Armoury was impossible. The lofty walls, erected of a strength sufiicient to defy all attacks by hostile mobs or by an army unprovided with artillery, B 2 4 Chicago To-Day. offered no point of ingress for the fireman with his hose. The narrow loopholed windows, which were a safe protection against bullets, were not less efficacious against water. The only means of obtaining access to the building so as to fight the flames, which were every moment gaining ground, was by the door. But the door was locked. The key could not be found ; and from the interior of the great building flames mingled with smoke climbed up into the midnight air. The firemen were baffled. While they were anxiously deliberating what should be done, their attention was suddenly arrested by a terrible sound. Inside the building, fast becoming a flaming fiery furnace, were heard sounds that told only too plainly that human beings were within, frantic with dread of being burned alive. The firemen tried in vain to l)urst open the massive door. It defied their utmost efforts. A howitzer would not have burst open the portal of the Armoury. Huge sledge-hammers pound- ing upon the ironclad gate only served as signals of unavailing hope to the doomed inside. Then re- membering the tremendous pressure of water, they turned jets from all available hose upon the stubborn door. But all these • tons of steady pressure failed even to strain the door on its hino;es. The knockino; within grew fainter and fainter. The cries of agonised despair became weaker and weaker. Eager and stalwart men, with all the resources of the great city at their back, were straining every eftbrt that in- genuity could suggest or human energy could carry out to rescue the doomed prisoners on the other side of the door. All was in vain. The door was locked. The key was lost. And so it came to pass that the feeble knocking ceased. No more cries were heard, The Cry of the Unemployed, 5 and when the fire had burnt itself out three or four calcined corpses were found on the other side of the bolted door. It was a grim and horrible experience, not to l)e thought of without a shudder ; but it resembles only too closely the miserable tragedy at which civilisation is now assisting in the city of Chicago. The edifice of our competitive commercialism built four-square to all the winds that blow, massive, imposing, im pregnable, has taken fire. But the door is locked, and neither is there any key forthcoming to unlock the wards of the great gate through which the inmates mig-ht o;o free. The world watches and sickens with horror ; l)ut the fire burns, the flames mount higher and higher, and there seems to be no escape. It is the tragedy of the Armoury fire rehearsed on a thou- sandfold greater scale. Chicago has become for the moment only too authentic a reproduction of the Bull of Phalarus, nor can any way of escape be suggested for the victims. The denunciations of the press, and the invectives which are freely showered on all concerned from one side to the other, are as impotent as the hammers and the water-jets with which the firemen endeavoured to force open the door of the Armoury. Day by day as the Old World and the New keep watching the progress of the blaze, the more hopeless seem to be the efibrts to extinguish the conflagration. It all results from one thing. The door is locked, and the key is not to be found. The key in the present instance was at first in the keeping of Mr. Pullman, to whose dogged refusal to permit any reference whatever of the dispute to arbitration is due the whole of the catastrophe ; but its real root lies deeper. It is to be found in the rooted distrust which is the 6 Chicago To-Day. canker of American civilisation. In business, men have forgotten God, they have lost faith in man, and they are reaping the penalty. From of old was it not written, " If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat of the fat of the land, but, if ye refuse and rebel, ye shall be devoured by the sword, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." This is not merely true of the immediate dispute and of the refusal of Mr. Pullman to accept any form of reference to arbitration. In every direction, wherever we turn, we are confronted with the same phenomenon. In place of the co-operation of con- fidence, there is everywhere the fiercest rivalry of cut-throat competition, eating confidence out of the heart of man. If, as Aristotle said long ago, civilisa- tion can be measured by the extent to which suspicion has been replaced by confidence, then, in the headlong rush after the Almighty Dollar, the attainment of which has almost become the chief end of man, we are face to face with a very real retrogression towards l^arbarism. It would seem as if we were witnessing the break- up of the old commercialism, which seems as if it were about to expire amid convulsions possibly as violent as those which marked the disappearance of feudalism from Europe at the close of last century. But he would 1)C a bold man who would assert that even now the labour pains of the new era have begun, they may be but false pains, and the new birth of time may still be many years distant. Mankind is slow to change, and as long as an old system can be made to do, it lasts, ^-^nly when things are quite intoleralJe do the children of men, more frequently in black despair than in gladsome hope, venture to abandon the old for the untried new. T/iC Cry of the Unemployed, 7 Even tlic old Feudalism, which was supposed to have expired in earthquake and crack of doom, con- trived to creep back again with indispensable modi- fications after millions had died in order tliat it might not Ije, and modern Commercialism seems to have no less firm a grip uj)on the world which it has ruled so long. For one reason, its heirs are not ready for the heritage, and we must, therefore, regard the in- dustrial convulsion which has just taken place in America as rather a warning than a judgment. But of the significance of the warning there can be no doubt. As usual, it is the economic crisis which shakes the old system to the ground. At the end of last century, it was the deficit which forced on the Eevolution, and never was a truer word spoken than that it was a deficit which saved the Republic. But for the deficit, the old regime might have continued secure in all the panoply of its power. So now, at the end of the 19th century, the unemployed are our industrial deficit which yawns wider and wider, and refuses to be choked. All the trouble in Chicao^o at this moment has arisen from the presence of the unemployed. As John Bright long ago remarked, whenever there are two men trying to get one man's job, wages go down ; and it is the presence of a mass of unemployed men in and about Chicago which has at once provoked the struggle, and led to the outburst of violence which has attracted the attention of an amazed and indig- nant world. One of the Chicago newspapers, commenting bitterly upon the Mayor's suggestion that in place of legislation to close shops on Sunday, the shoj^men should secure their one day's rest in seven by a strike, asked pertinently enough, " How men could 8 Chicago To- Day. be expected to strike when every man knew that there were half-a-dozen others who would eagerly compete to fill his berth the moment he left the shop ? " When the boycott of the railroads was declared, an official of the Illinois Central is said to have remarked that, if all their 2,000 men left them on the spot, they could fill their places ten times over from a list of applications by unemployed men which had been compiled a short time previously. Whatever may have been the original cause of the depression which has affected so severely the great industrial community of the West, there is no douljt that it has been aggravated and perpetuated by the unrest and uncertainty as to the tariff which is due to the dogged refusal of protected monopolists to bow to the declared will of the majority of the people. Until the tariff is settled one way or another no man knows under what conditions he can manufacture. It is asserted, not apparently without cause, that those interested in the maintenance of high duties have delil^erately prolonged the stagnation in order to emphasise their arguments for j)erpetuating what is, to all intents and purposes, a subsidy from the general pu1)lic for the enriching of a comparatively small but very powerful fraction of the community. But even uncertainty of the tariff would not have done so much mischief if there had been a little more sense of brotherhood infused into the business relations, not only between employers and employed, but ])etween the employers themselves. However that may be, it can hardly be said that " each for him- self, and the devil take the hindmost," is working very satisfactorily in the great Republic of the West. In England we have certainly no reason to indulge in any Pliarisaic reflections upon the misfortunes of The Cry of the Unemployed. 9 our American kinsfolk. AVe have too many illustra- tions at home of the evil consequences of the working of the same spirit, although fortunately with us they are on the smaller scale which corresponds to the comparative dimensions of our respective countries. But on a smaller scale or large, the riddle of the Sphinx confronts us as well as the United States, and it will l;)est be solved by those who have most of the spirit of Him who said, " Blessed are the peacemakers, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." Sooner or later the race will learn that it is not merely the ■ kingdom of heaven that is the heritage of the peace- maker. Without the spirit of peace and of brother- hood, and a readiness to bear one another's burdens, all the harvest of the world's wealth seem to turn to dead sea fruit in our mouths. The providing for the unemployed is one which some Americans are very slow to recognise. At Chicago last winter the question of the relief of the unemployed was one which forced itself upon my attention l)y the barbarity of housing the casuals in the police- stations and in the corridors of the City Hall. At iirst there was a disposition to resent the maudlin sentimentality of English philanthropy, and to main- tain that the American tramp deserved to be kicked by day and housed in the police-stations at night. But after various ministers, professors, and lal)our leaders had visited the police-cells and the City Hall, sufficient steam was generated to oret the whole question of the relief of the distress taken in hand by a representative committee of citizens. For the first time for many winters the unemployed w^ere fur- nished with work on the streets, by which they at any rate could earn their rations and pay for lodgings in a decent lodging-house. Hitherto, they had I o Chicago To- Day. always camped in the corridors of the City Hall or been lodged in the police-stations ; this year they were brigaded into street gangs three thousand strong, and set to work at the necessary work of cleaning the streets. The formation of the Relief Association was due to the Civic Federation. The Committee, un- • organised as it was, took the initiative, summoned a conference of all the charitable associations and societies in the city, and at that conference formed a central relief committee, which took the whole sub- ject in hand. Mr. Harvey, well known as Mr. Moody's chairman, and founder of the town of Harvey, who had from the outset taken a great interest in the movement, was appointed chairman of the relief asso- ciation, and for the next three months he devoted the whole of his time to this necessary and indispensable work. A sum of from £40,000 to £50,000 was raised for the relief Three thousand men were set to work on the streets. Some two thousand women were assisted through the agency of the AVoman's Club and its indefatigable president, Mrs. Dr. Stevenson. It was found, contrary to general belief, that seventy- five per cent, of the men out of work had resided, in Chicago for more than five years. The unions did a great deal to support their own meml)ers, and the saloon-keepers, by their free lunches, fed a larger number of people than the public and private charities provided for ; and so, by one way or another, the distress was tided over. The men employed in the relief work on the streets were paid ten cents an hour for shifts varying from three hours in the case of single men, and of eight hours in the case of married. They were provided with tickets, which were re- deemable in goods at certain central stores, where each ten cent ticket was exchangeable for food and The Cry of the Unemployed. 1 1 clothes, wliicli, if tliey had been purchased in the stores, would have cost from fifty to a hundred per cent, as much. That is to say, the ten cent ticket had a purchasing value of from fifteen to twenty cents. That was very good, and nothing could have l)een more commendable than the zeal and the energy which Mr. Harvey and Dr. Stevenson and their zealous as- sistants worked in administering to their less fortunate fellow-creatures, but it was a significant fact that the bulk of the contributions for the relief of the unem- ployed came, not from the wealthy, but the workmen who worked, the shopman, and those who were much nearer the low level of the out-of-work than the millionaires. Still relief work is but a miseral)le, although necessary palliative of a social disaster, and many a time I recalled Carlyle's eloquent and indignant discourse on a similar state of things in England, as he saw it nearly half a century since : — ■ England is full of wealth, of multifarious produce, supply for human want in every kind ; yet England is dying of inanition. With unabated bounty the land of England blooms and grows ; waving with yellow harvests ; thick studded with workshops, industrial implements, witli fifteen millions of workers, imderstood to be the strongest, the cnnningest, the willingest our Earth ever had ; these men are here, the work they have done, the fruit they have realised is here, abundant exuberant on every hand of us : and behold some baneful fiat as of Enchantment has gone forth saying, " Touch it not, ye workers, ye master-workers, ye master-idlers ; none of you can touch it, no man of you shall be the better for it; this is the enchanted fruit!" On the poor workeis such fiat falls first in its rudest shape; but on the rich master- workers too it falls ; neither can the rich master-idlers, nor any richestest or highest man escape, but all arc like to be brought low with it, and made poor ill the money sense or in a far fataler one. Of these successful skilful workers some two millions, it is now counted, sit iu Workhouses, Poor-law Prisons, or have "oiit-door relief " flung over the wall to tliein, — the wurk- house Bastille being filled to bursting, and tiie strung Pour-law being brukeu asunder by a stronger. They sit tlierc these many mouths now, their hope of deliverance as yet small. In workhouses, pleasantly so named liecause work cannot be done in them, Twelve-huudred-thousaud workers in England alone ; their cuiiuiug right hand lamed, lying idle iu their sorrowful busoni ; their hopes, outlooks, shares in this fair world, shut iu by uariMW walls. They sit there, pent up, as if iu a kind of horrid enchantment ; glad to be imprisoned, enchanted that they may not perish, starved. The picturesque 1 2 Chicago To'Day. Tourist in a simiiy Autumn day, tliiough this bounteous England, descries t!io Union Workhouse on his path. "Passing by the Workhouse in St. Ives, Huntingdonshire, on a bright day last summer," says the picturesque Tourist, " I saw sitting on wooden benches, in front of their Bastille, and within their ring-wall and its railings, some half-hundred or moic of these men. Tall robust figures, young mostly or of middle age ; of honest countenance, many of them thoughtful and even intelligent-looking men. They sat there near by one another ; but in a kind of torpor, especially in a silence which was very striking. In silence : for alas, what word was to be said ? An Earth all lying round ciying come and till me, come and reap me; — yet we here sit enchanted ! In the eyes and brows of these men hung the gloomiest ex- pression, not of anger, but of grief and shame and manifold inarticulate distress and weariness; they returned my glance with a glance which seemed to s;iy, 'Do not look at us. We sit enchanted here we know not why. The Sun shines and the Earth calls and, by the governing Powers and Impotences of this England, we are forbidden to obey. It is impossible, they tell us.' There was something that reminded me of Dante's Hell in the look of all this ; and I rode swiftly away." Dante's Hell indeed is suggested by all such doleful spectacles, of which the United States has this year seen more than enough. Unfortunately, we cannot, like Mr. Carlyle, ride swiftly away from the miser- able spectacle. The question of setting the unemployed to work was much discussed in Chicasfo last winter, and one evening the Sunset Club made it the subject of a special discussion. Professor Henderson, of the Uni- versity, opened the discussion with a carefully written paper, in which, after surveying the whole of the situation, he finished by declaring that the appalling suffering of the year might purchase great improve- ment by compelling the people to study the funda- mental laws of social health, and to drop all social antagonism, in order to promote the common welfare. It fell to my lot to follow Dr. Henderson, and I do not think I can do better than reproduce what I said : — lam very glad to have an opportunity to put before you,- who represent much of the youth, of the enterprise, and of the brain of Chicago, some con- clusions that have been rather forcibly brought home to my mind during this stay which I have made iu your midst — a stay which has been so pleasant ami so profitable that I feel as if it wi^s never going to come to au ejid- But The Cry of the Unemployed. i2> there is one thing about your city which is not pleasant, axiil that is the re- appearance, in the midst ot one of the newest communities of the new world, of that spectre which haunts the older civilisations of Europe. A Danisli lady talking to me since I came to this city said, "Is it not dreadful, this civilisation of Chicago ? It is like the wizened features of an old man upon the body of a child." That is rather a cruel saying, but unquestionably there are many of the old world features with which we are too painfully familiar, reproducing themselves in your midst this winter, and reprodueino themselves as a characteristic of the old world nations transplanted to a new world soil, on a larger scale, and with hideous accompaniments from which wo in the older world are hap^^ily free. But in relation to the treatment of the homeless destitute, I have not yet seen any city in Europe which has been so hard driven and so ill provided with what we should consider the ordinary appliances of a civilised com- munity as to use its worst police stations in which to herd unemployed workmen, side by side with the refuse of your criminals ; or to convert the stately municipal palace iu which you transact the business of your city into a c;isual ward for homeless workmen. That we have not in London ; tlicd is an aggravation and a refinement which I have not been accustomed to ; and to the gentleman who said " No, no," I can only say, mention a city in whicli it is worse. Now the first tiling that strikej you, as it strikes every other man, is what Carlyle put so forcibly and strongly years ago. He said, "There is not a horse that is sound in wind, limb and sight, which, if it is straggling round without an owner, would not eagerly be led to a stable, housed and fed, but your able-bodied biped, to rear whom it has cost much more in food and thought than it has your horse, who from tlie cash point of view, if you could put him upon the block and sell him, would probably bring more tiian the horse, yet wanders round ownerless and mastcrless, seeking in vain as the greatest of earthly blessings his share of tlie primeval curse upon mankind." It is a great line, that of Mrs. Browning's, that " God in cursing gives us better gifts than man in blessing," and it would be a great thing indeed if to our one hundred thousand unemployed in this city we could give their share of that " work " which was in ancient days regarded as a curse, and now is sought for in vain as an imaltainable blessing by so many. Now, think for one moment what it means. One hundred thousand men and women out of work in this city, representing to the community wliich might profit by their work, five hundred tliousand dollars a week. Five hundred thousand dollars a week is the fine whicli society, thoughtlessly, or at any rate arbitrarily, loads upon one hundred thousand ; they bear it, and are bearing it. Five hundred thousand dollars represents their loss ; and it is going on. There are in this town some million odd who arc employed, who are well fed, more or less, who at any rate have fire in their stoves and a roof over their heads, and something to eat. Do you mean to tell me it is impossible for this million who are employed to provide means, to find employment for those who are un- employed, seeing that one hundred thousand have to bear a fine amounting to five hundred thousand dollars a week in enforced idleness? The unions are supporting skilled labour, so I am told by their leaders, to the best of their ability, and probably on the unionists of this town there is placed a heavier tax fro rata than is falling upon any other class in the community except those who are actually out of work. But when we leave the unionists, and those who are absolutely out of work, there remains a great body of more or less •well-to-do people, whom I presume you represent, and of whom for the moment I am one. What shall we do for the unemployed ? The answer is very simple — 14 Chicago To-Day . employ tbciu ! Employ them ! Dou't pauperise them ; but give them work as you would if these people were your own blood relations, brothers and sisters, born of tlie one father and mother. But as they happen to be more or less remote relations, it does not come home to you. You say, " What can we give them to do ? " I speak with some trepidation, for fear I shall bo taken up by tlie gentleman who resents these passing observations from a stranger, but I will say this, that I realise the compliment paid to tlie stranger in tlie extreme sensitiveness shown to his passing remarks, and also tliat if the gentleman who has inti- mated his dissent were to come to London and say of us a thousand-fold harder things than any which I have ventured to hint of Chicago, there is not one of us would care a straw what he said. Now, if there are those who think there is no practical work waiting to bo done in Chicago, upon which you can profitably employ tlie unemployed at this moment, I think that that person must have what we should call in Eng- land a very insular and parochial conception of the world and the things that are therein. I do not know how it strikes you, living in the midst of this city, but, coming to it as a stranger, coming to it with an immense admiration from old time for the enterprise and energy and wealth of your city, I must honestly say that I was taken not a little aback to see how very much you still had waiting to be done in order to bring your city uji — I won't say to the level of an ideal city, in an impossible world — but to the level of a city in an ordinarily well governed and civilized state in Europe. I think there are many things in which your city is far and away ahead of any city tliat I have ever seen in my own country, or in Europe ; but side by side with the things of which you are proud, and justly proud, you have allowed what we should call the pauper class, a poor, forlorn, dirty class, to grow up inider conditions where they are without the api)liances of eivili/atitm wliich an ordinary German or Frencli or Englisii city would think absolutely indispensable for the living of an ordinary human life. There arc midtitudes of little Ihings that attrai^t a stranger. I will only mention one as a very small thing, but I do think that to the stranger and wayfaring man your city would bo more attractive if you would condescend to follow the ordinary practice of civilized cities and put the names of streets at every street corner, so that we might know where we are going. I think also it would be a little improvement, both for health and for con- venience, especially of the poorer people, if you should provide, as Paris provides, and as London has begun to provide, lavatoiics and other con- veniences, at accessible and ea.sy spots all over your great city. The neglect of the ordinary necessities of human nature in your city is a disgrace to any community, civilized or barbarous, and I have never met any person, who talked straight and plain across the table, who would not admit it. Why is it not done then ? And until it is done is there not work waiting to be done ? Take again the question of cleaning your streets. Perhaps some persons may think that your streets are in an id( al cundition of cleanliness, but if so, I think that their ideal of cleanliness would not be found very general in Chicago. There are streets that would emp'loy many able-bodied men, and I am glad to think that the Kelief Association is going to employ men in that way. There is also something that has been in-gcd by mayor after mayor of your town, better paving on your back streets, where your poor live. To you and to me a badly paved street means little more than the change of boots after we get home ; to the poor man it may mean colds, pneumonia, rheumatism, and it means much to the poor man's children. Of course, if it be thought desirable to keep down your The Cry of the Uneinployea. 1 5 j)opulation, tliere is a good deal to be said in favour of keeping your pavements and alleys in such a state of filth. But cousidering the economic value of labour, and how much each workman loses every day he is out of work, con- sidering the children's stunted limbs and the m;dadies from wliich they will never recover, I think you will find a great deal to do in mnking the tene- ment houses and the back streets of Chicago fit for your cliildrcn to live in, and for mine ; and yet other people's children have to live there now. You may go on to enumerate, as the preceding si)eaker did, the work to be done in your j)arks ; work to be done in putting up laundries and baths as civic institutions in every corner of your densely populated districts, and which we in our retrograde and backward country have learned some years ago to regard as necessities of civilisation, even though we do not quite hold that because a man is dirty therefore he is a tramp and outside the pale of civilization. Yet here you have a town where the only place in which a poor man can get his face washed is a saloon, and when a man does not get his face washed and goes about dirty he is treated by many among you as if he was a dirty tramp who was uncivilized and unworthy the sympathy of any well-disposed citizen. Give a man a chance to get a clean face anyhow. Then there are many other things. There is the People's Palace whiclx you are going to put up on the lake shore. There is a post-office which you want to have pulled down — and the sooner the better. There are police stations which are not altogether creditable to the civilization and philan- thropy of your town. I do not know how long it would last if you would go arormd Harrison Street Station to-night after leaving this place and see how your fellow-citizens are locked up. I think it would do you good, and I am (luite sure it would do you more good if you might be locked up yourself for the night. There are otlier works, such as making main drains, and making roads, and especially building what I think ought to be regarded as indispensable if Chicago is to hold up her head among the cities of the world. I think in every ward of this great city you should have at hast one People's Institute or Civic Club House, where the poorest of tlie people would bo at home, iiisti ad of having no home but the seven thousand five hundred saloons into which they must go in leisure hours after they have done their work. There is the providing of clothing for school children. There is an endless amount of work to be done that needs to be done, and you have an army of a hundred thousand iniempbiyed with whicli to do it, who want to do it, and yet you say you cannot get it done. You . want the money, you say. You want money to bring the two together. Well, you know you are rich in Chicago. You are not laden down and burdened as we are in the old world. But we get many tiling.^ that you have not, and among other things good roads, which you have not ; and how did they get them in France ? War, ladies and gentlemen. It wasn't philanthropy ; it was not an enlightened interest ; it was the dire exi^.^ency of w:ir that made it necessary for the Revolutionary armies and for Napoleon to be able to trundle his cannon to the utmost parts of France tliat made the roads of France at this moment the ideal roads of tlie world. Arc you going to wait for a similar compulsion ? l Yoir know your great poet Lowell has said "Not but wut abstract war is horrid, I sign to thet with all my heart; But civlyzation tZoes get forrid Sometimes upon a powder cart." And it certainly has made better roads in France than peace and prosperity have in America. Could you not make reads ? Are j^ou to wait for war ? 1 6 Chicago To-Day. But we liave another factor in Europe which I hope j ou will not have here. Civilization gets a lift upoQ the powder cart of war, but civilization has also re- ceived many a lift from the hand of revolution, in the tumbril of the death cart. It is a liabit which human beings have when they don't get enough to eat to go out and kill somebody. That rule, I believe, is the almost universal rule. Let it go long enough, and, gentlemen — and ladies too — if there is no other way in which to get something to eat you and I would go out and kill somebody. It is the fundamental, and so far as we can see, the invariable law of human nature. We have found it in Europe and we liave taken lessons thereby, imperfectly, but to some extent. I sincerely hope you may never liave to take it to heart here. But I do not think I exaggerate when I say that one single night of wild despair in the streets of Chicago, without the use of dynamite, merely with the use of torch or club, would do your city more harm and shako your credit worse than all the millions that would be needed to give every- one of these people work all through the winter. Do you think that if among our hundred thousand unemployed men and women there were to rise a Napoleon, a man with the brain of Na- poleon, witii the power of organisation and the energy of Napoleon, and with that magnetic power over his fellow-men, that these hundred tiiousand would not try to do something for themselves ? I do not mean by violence ; I mean by endeavouring so to organise the whole mass of the unemployed into what may be called an industrial co-partnership or army, under strict discipline, ready to work for rations, determined and ready to dedicate themselves, tlie whole army of one hundred thousand, to sujjply to Chicago those appliances of civilization for tlie poor and for those wiio are down in the world, which at present Chicago lacks — -do you think that if such a man were to arise, witli the confidence of his fellow-men, and were to get those people together, a:ul they were to parade your streets, a great army, a hundred thousand strong, and were to ask, " Will you who own the money supply us with the tools ? " Do you think that you would hesitate ? I don't think you would. I think that you would find a way to answer them ; because whatever offence I may have committed in speaking of your city, I liave a great and boundl, ss faith in Chicago, and the people of Chicago. It is because I have that faith I have lingered here so Jong; it is because I believe you, more than any people in any city in which I have ever been, respond to a great and noble ideal, that I am still liere for some weeks, and because I find in you a faith, and a courage, and a determination, to fry things to see what can be done, which older cities have not; and I believe when our unemployed show that they are willing to enter into such an industrial copartnership or co-operation, in which each man would work according to his might, and receive according to his need, you will raise as much money as is necessary to put the whole army at work. You will say, "How?" Well, Mr. Chairman, I have the misfortune, it may be, to come from an old monarchical country wiiere we have some government of the people by the representatives of the people, and when I look at your city governments, with my English instincts, I say that your mayor and your city council are, according to our English ideas, the natural and proper authorities by whom this thing ought to be done. And we ar(> more and more learning, in England, to look to our municipal authorities as the moderating power. Instead of crowding all the work to be done in the summer tinre, we keep back as much as possible for the winter time, so as to equalise the demand for labour within the area of the municipality. I know I shall be told, " Your civic government in England is one thing, but civic government in America is another thing." Gentlemen, I believe your civic government in Chicago is very much what you wish it to be. When you wish to have it different it will be different. But, mind you, you must will it, and The Cry of the Unemployed. 1 7 will it hard. It will not do to will it in a nice namby-pamby way, and tlicu g.) to bed and think it will be changed, for nothing is changed like that; but if you make up your minds to use that lever that is ready to your liauds in the City Hall, in order to do whatever is necessary to be done to provide employment for your people, to renovate your city, to make Chicago lead the world as a city in which people live, as she led the world in creating a city to which people went to enjoy themselves and admire the great works of the world, you will find that whoever is mayor and whatever may be the conslitu- tmn of your city council, they will do your bidding. Then it may be said, "That is all very well; but jou don't know the constitution of the city of Chicago, its charter, and the laws of t!ie slate of Illinois." Well, gentlemen, is it not time to stop this fooling and begin business — for it is foolish, just as your regulations about gambling have become foolish ? Stop this opera bouffe government, of which you ought to be ashamed, respectable and serious citizens of Chicago, although I say it. The comptroller- goes on to say that you cannot raise any money, not §ven fur the most necetsary work, because you have reached the limits fixed by the charter, which is five per cent, of the assessed value. But, says the comp- troller, if the assessment were raised to its proper figure you would have no difficulty in raising fifty or a hundred millions of dollars to-morrow if j'ou like. Then, surely, if you mean business, don't i^retend you can't do it. It is only because for some inscrutable reason you keep your assessments low that you cannot raise the money which you ought to raise, and which before long you may be compelled to raise by more difficult methods than those which I have suggested. There is another thing — and this is the last word that I shall say — you say your municipality cannot raise the requisite number of millions. I wisii some of you would go to a pawnbroker ; I think he would teach you how to raise money. I look at your funded debt and I see it amounts to eighteen millions, and lor that you have forty-one million of assets in buildings and schools and waterworks. In other words, your funded debt is covered twice over by your realized property. Why, there is not a man in Chicago who cannot pawn his thirt if he wants to, and if you tell me Chicago cannot raise the needed money upon forty-one millions of property, I cannot say much for the financial ability of the city of Chicago. Don't delude yourself by pretending that there are constitutional difficulties in the way. What is the motto of the city of Chicago ? Is it not, " I will " ? To think that a city that has the sublime audacity to take that for a motto, should stand swathed like a babe in swaddling clothes in red tape restrictions ! If I had the power of Haroun al Kaschid, of the Arabian Nights, and could stand at the door with my janissaries and compel every man and woman of you to dress yourselves m the apparel of the poorest of tlie unemployed of the city of Chicago and could lake your clothes and put them upon those unemployed, and then should turn you out into the streets of this city and keep you there all Christmas week, living as they live, feeding as they feed, hungering as they hunger, looking forward into a future of despair as they look forward, you would raise all the money needed by New Year's Day, every cent of it. The speech attracted a great deal of attention, was rather bitterly discussed, and led some persons — why I do not know — to regard me with an c 1 8 Chicago To-Day. antipathy wliicli was far greater than the merely surface outcry that was raised after my remarks at the Woman's Club. No doubt I spoke frankly, and the curious may see in some of the suggestions the germ of the idea which, working in other minds, led to Coxeyism and the armies of the Commonweal. Coxey, however, was far from being a Napoleon, and the winter passed without any serious trouble. The spring brought with it hopes of revival in trade, and immediately, like a frost, came the fierce struggle in the coal trade, of which I give some account in another chapter. Notwithstanding this, and the continued uncertainty about the tariff, keen observers rejoiced to note that the industrial de- pression showed signs of departing. Dr. Albert Shaw, writing in the American Review of Reviews for July, publishes the following re- assuring report as to the shrinkage of the unem- ployed. He says : — We are inclined to accept certain evidences that bave come to our notice which indicate that a turn of the tide of business affairs will soon be apparent in all quarters. We have now received direct and authoritative information from nearly all the cities which adopted relief measures early in the present year, and almost everywhere it was found possible several weeks ago to abandon all special relief measures, and to disband the Citizens' Com- mittees under which relief was administered in most of the large towns. Our Philadelphia informant gives us the very striking information that the recent opening of mills, fiictories, furnaces and manufacturing establishments in general, has given employment to more than 80,000 persons, the greater part of whom had been dependent upon the relief committee for help. He declares that ' the committee's work would have been kept up during the summer months had there been any necessity for it ; but matters have improved in almost every direction.' From the New England towns, where important relief measures were necessary, we have received very encouraging reports. TJiis is particularly true as regards such manufacturing places as Lynn, Cam- bridge, Springfield and Providence. From Boston Mayor Matthews writes : " In reply to your letter I would say that the relief work is all ended, as well as the necessity for it." This short sentence speaks volumes as to the capacity of American industry to absorb labour temporarily out of employ- ment. The greatest relief work of all, in some respects, was that instituted by the Citizens' Committee at Pittsburg. It expended more than a quarter of a The Cry of the Unci]iployed. 19 million dollars, half of which Mr. Andrew Carnegie contributed. The com- mittee gave total or partial fenjiport to more than 14,000 men, representing 47,000 persons dependent upon their labour. The relief operations have been wound up, and while we are informed that there are still a good many men in need of work, the exceptional stress has wholly disappeared. TJio Cincinnati situation, which, though severe, was admirably met by the rally of business men and municipal authorities around tiie Associateel Charities as a centre, is quite normal again ; and one-third of the special municipal relief fund that was appropriated remains unexpended. In Milwaukee and Toledo, in Cleve- land and Columbus, greatly improved conditions are visible. Our report from Kansas City begins with this sentence : " All necessity for special relief of the imemployed has disappeared in this community." The adjustment of the strikes and the resumption of mining activity gives Colorado the assurance of a very busy autumn. It can be said for New York City and Brooklyn that most of the men and women who were seeking work in the winter and spring have found employment. There is every reason to believe that if Congress will but pass the tiiriff bill and adjourn, the quickened wheels of manufac- turing industry and the call for men to harvest ripening crops and to supply the demand for coal and lumber and other materials, will at once afford a chance for every able-bodied man in the United States to work. It is reason- able to estimate that fully nine-tenths of the unemployed labour of three or four months ago has already been absorbed, and a very little quickening of the industrial life will provide for those remaining. This, I am afraid, is a too sanguine estimate, l)ut whether it was so or not will never be ascertained, for once again, just when the cup of prosperity seemed to be returning to the lips of a suffering people, there has broken out an industrial contest, so fierce and so widespread as to compel even the optimist to mutter \h^ terrible word " Civil AVar." How it all came about, and how it is that this summer's Chicago, the great commercial centre of a peaceful common- wealth, was like a city in a state of siege, will be told in subsequent chapters. c 2 MR. CAEL BROWNE, COXEY'S LIEUTENANT 21 Chapter II. — The Petition in Boots. "The opening passages of Carlyle's ' Past and Present,' describina: the state of Enoland about 1842, are a very perfect description of tlie United States to-day. Unrest, discontent, and fear are present in all minds and among all classes of people. We seem to l)e on the edge of some great upheaval, but one can never tell whether it Avill turn out a tragedy or a farce. Whatever the end is, the present is full of specu- lation and wonder, and it is not a time when one can expect calm reasoning and deliberate unselfish action on the part of anyb(3dy. The determined optimist will see promise in this state of things, and the pessi- mist will see the opposite. I being sometimes an optimist and sometimes a pessimist, feel and think accordingly. Between times I wonder." So wrote to me, on the 7th of June, one of the shrewdest, brightest, and most sympathetic observers of the course of events from the vantage point of the city of Chicago. Her observation is just. Over and over again, when I was in Chicago, I remarked that what the West most wanted was the widespread cir- culation of Carlyle's "Latter-Day Pamphlets," his "Chartism," and his "Past and Present." The gospel of Carlyle is much needed across the Atlantic, where hitherto, despite Emerson, the prophet of Chelsea has been at a pretty considerable discount. As was England in 1842, so is America to-day. When Chartism was l)rewiiig, hardly thirty years had 2 2 Chicago To-Day. elapsed since the Ijattle of Waterloo liad settled tlie fate of Napoleon. About tlie same spa-ce of time separates the Americans from the surrender of General Lee, which marked the final overthrow of the Con- federacy. Capitalism in America, for the most part, is where Capitalism was in the Old Country, when even men as advanced as Bright and Cobden regarded factory legislation as a monstrous invasion of the liberty of the su1:)ject. It is like going back to the middle of the century to visit the American Republic. In most matters j)ertaining to social evolution, in things industrial, and, indeed, in many other things, they are about fifty years behind us. Their trades unions are still regarded with the same suspicion, resentment, and distrust that they were looked upon in the Old Country before the repeal of the combination laws. Labour, on its part, relies more upon violence than upon or- ganisation, and when a strike occurs, slaughter, on one side or the other, is regarded as an ordinary and unavoidable incident. It is diflicult to conceive a more cruel satire upon the simple faith of the Radical- ism in which I was brought up than to witness how little free education and the penny daily ^^aper have succeeded in helping these millions of Engiisli- speaking men to keep step with the vanguard of their race. It seems almost incredible, but let any one who questions it test \}ii'-T THAT ^.vuolo F^Jitovv with /^MO(Jev' I f j .0 W' ■ I Cu'^''^^'"-^# "■'X-fl \-.«.»'"' 'J.J.'.tO viPOM 1>U,T>i ^M.-.t vf,i.3f ; •itE ; J>\tH,LOoK Qy^ TH>5 — Sy - MON-V THE KOADS W0O« J^rn-- ALL tH£ T.'-^^E' PETITION TO THE HOUSE OF EEPKESENTATIVES, UO Be THEi^ 28 Chicago To- Day. most indispensable for all those wlio would air tlieir grievances, and C'oxey by instinct seems to have divined how to do it. To the Press the intrinsic importance of subjects is a comparatively trivial detail ; the supreme question is not one of intrinsic importance, but of capacity to yield sensational " copy." The sole test of news value is its selling currency, and any one who wishes to catch the ear of the public must do something, by describing which the keepers of the ears of the said j)ublic can make the indispensable red cent. It is as much the business of any one who wishes to secure the atten- tion of the public to devise ways and means of making it profitable to the Press to report him, as it is the business of a candidate to win his election, or of a Minister to secure a majority. Every one in America knew of the existence of the unemployed. Every newspaper reader was bored to death with discussions as to what should be done with tramps and out-of-works. It seemed almost impossible to contrive any device by which this grim and worn- out topic could be served up in good saleable news- paper articles. But Coxey did the trick. Coxey compelled all the newspapers of the Continent to devote from a column to six columns a day to re- porting Coxeyism, that is to say wdth echoing the inarticulate clamour for work for the workless. That was a great achievement. To have accomplished it shows that Coxey is not without genius. No mil- lionaire in all America could, without ruining himself, have secured as much space for advertising his wares as Coxey commanded without the outlay of a red cent, by the ingenious device of his petition in boots. A writer in the Railwai/ Conductor finds a parallel to the Coxey mo^^ement in the march of the Blan- The Petition in Boots. 29 keteers, which took place in England in the spring of the year 1817, and tluis describes that crusade : — ■ " The Blanketeers were a body of men who raarclied to London, much in the manner in which the Commonwealers are now marching to Washington, for tlie purpose of presenting petitions to Parliament and inducing that body t) accede to their demands for the enactment of certain measures of reform in tlie government. The movement had its origin among the weavers of Lancashire. Early in March of the year 1817, the 10th of the month, I believe it was, a vast body of working men assembled in St. Peter's Field at Manchester for the purpose of discussing the question of Parliamentary reform which was just then agitating the country, and for the further purpose of organising an army which should march to London and present its petition to Parliament in a body. This meeting was caUed the ' Blanket Meeting,' because of the fact that those who attended were observed to have a blanket, or large coat, rolled up and strapped, knapsack fashion, to their backs ; and, for the same reason, those who participated in the movement were known as ' Blanketeers.' Some carried biuidles under their arms ; some carried rolls of paper in their hands, supposed to be petitions which had been got ready to present to Parliament upon their arrival in London, and many liad stout walking sticks in their hand to assist them on tlieir journey. The magistrates came upon the field where tliis meeting took place and read the Riot Act. (One week before this, on Marcli 3, the Habeas Corpus Act had been suspended tiu'oughout the kingdom, under 'An act to empower his Majesty to secure and detain such persons as Jiis Majesty shall suspect are conspiring against his person and government.') " The meeting was dispersed by the military and the constables ; and no more than three hundred of the Blanketeers, witliout leaders, and without organisation, began their straggling march toward London. These were followed by a body of constables who api)reheuded some and induced others to desert, until, when the Blanketcets spread their blankets at Macclestield, at nine o'clock that night, they numbered less than two hundred. These kept on their march, their numbers meanwhile continually decreasing because of desertions and arrests by the authorities along the line of march, until the 17th of the month, when a mere handful of the original Blanketeer army reached the outskirts of London and concluded to disband without having accomplished their purpose of ajipealing to Parliament. " Many of the men went into the Blanketeers movement actuated by the belief that it was the most efiective way in which they could exercise their right of petition ; but the belief was erroneous; Parliament continued in its vicious course of manufacturing social legislation undisturbed by tlie Blan- keteer movement : and in this respect, also, history will no doubt repeat itself with regard to the Commonwealers and the Congress of the United States." The origin of Coxeyism, the source and secret spring of all its power, is to be found in the existence of an immense number of unemployed men in \X\^ United States. It is indeed startling to learn on the au- thority of such unimpeachable authorities as Dunn and j(3radstreefs, that last winter there were from three to 30 Chicago To- Day, four million workless workers in the American Re- public. Even if these figures are exaggerated, they point to the existence of a mass of human misery from which it had been hoped the New World would be free. If Bixidstreet's be right, the Americans had an army of unemployed last winter as numerous as the soldiers under the colours in all the standing armies of Europe. The political economist who waxes eloquent over the waste of wealth occasioned by the bloated armaments of the present century, always reckons the cost of the withdrawal of so many able- bodied men from productive industry as a heavier tax than the mere expense of their maintenance. The United States has no standing army of soldiers to speak of; ])ut its army of unemployed is indirectly almost as expensive as our European soldiery. The workless worker produces as little as the drilled soldier, and although the manoeuvres of the parade ground are economically valueless, they are superior, at least in providing occupation, to the condition of enforced indolence in which the unemployed pass their time. Yet America is very wealthy. It is i\\Q land of millionaires. But as in England in 1842, "in the midst of plethoric plenty the people perish ; w^ith gold walls and full barns no man feels himself safe or satisfied. Have we actually got enchanted, then — accursed l)y some god ? " To that question Coxey and his pemiiless pilgrims of industry have compelled all men to make some answer. Coxey, who has given his name to the movement, is little more than a figure-head. The real man on the horse is not Coxey, but Browne ; and even Browne is without infiuence or authority outside the Ohio con- tingent of the Coxeyite forces. The movement is not ,5- Chicago To-Day. that of any one man. Coxeyism is as little the handi- work of Coxey as the French Revolution was the work of Mirabeau or of Robespierre. Coxeyism is a kind of sporadic growth. The idea of petitions in boots commended itself to widely scattered groups of miserable men, all of whom have but one idea and one prayer. " Work, give us work," is their cry, and as it is to the Government they address their prayer, they set their faces towards Washington. Every newspaper in the country blames the party to which it does not belong for the bad times. Party politicians in the States habitually speak as if pros- perity were in the gift of the Administration. The Federal Government, with its tariffs and its subsidies, is constantly called upon to play the part of an Earthly Providence to the classes. Coxeyism only asks that the same Deus ex machind which has for a whole generation been invoked to fatten millionaires should exert a little of its omnipotence to secure work for the unemployed. As the Mcenad throng of Parisians led by Demoiselle Theroigne poured tumul- tuous upon Versailles to demand bread, so Coxeyism, with its multitudinous ragged regiments, bent its steps towards AYashington. Versailles is within easy marching distance from the Hotel de Ville of Paris. In America space is a great obstacle — how great no one adequately realises until he has been there. Hence the great difficulty of Coxey. But from an adver- tising point of view the parade was all the longer and the more drawn out. AVhen Coxey started he declared that he would lead 100,000 men to AVashington. But it is the custom with agitators everywhere, and especially in the States, where the continental dimensions of the Republic seem to foster a habit of inflated and The Petition in Boots. ZZ exaggerated assertion, to adjust tlieir prophecies rather to their hopes than their expectations. In the band which Coxey led in person from Massillon in Ohio to the steps of the Capitol in Washington he never had more than five hundred men, and some- times he had only one hundred. ()f the other armies a similar story might be told. From the obscure and complicated record of the movements of the industrials the only thing that is quite clear is that there were never in the whole Coxeyite demonstration more than ten thousand men on the road at one time.* The various " armies " with their maximum strengrth may be set down as follows Starting Number Commander. Point. of Men. Coxey ... ]\Iassillon, Oliio ... ... 500 Fryo ... IjOS Angeles ... 1000 Kelly . . . San Francisco ... 2000 Eandall ... Cliicago ... 1000 Hogan ... Montana ... 500 — ... Oregon ... 900 Many other " armies " sprang up in May. But the later comers never swelled the total to 10,000 men. As there were more than five thousand persons receiving relief in Chicago alone last winter, it is evident that the numbers of the petitioners in boots were but an almost infinitesimal proportion to the numbers of the actual unemployed. The army of tramps who are constantl}^ on the road in the States is said to number 60, 000. f But the greater number * The official historian of the Commonweal movement, Mr. Henry Vincent, estimates that twelve of the armies number 7,000, but tliis is probably an exaggeration. t The American is slowly beginning to see that the tramp question cannot be solved for ever by the simple process of hustling the tramp on to the next village. Mr. E. Hofer, in the Ooerland Montldy, proposes a plain but somewhat novel remedy for the solution of the tramp problem. His investigations on the subject lead him to the following conclusion ; "It is ihe duty of the State, to enact laws tbat shall regulate the tramp, and protect itH pitizms aga'nst iiim. Let a etockade of seveial bundrtd acres (-f vild land— limcer land D STATUTE MILES "loo 100 300 ^uO . ftoutcs o-f ■tht'Cof.eyltes'. Principal Flailnayi. State BounJar/ei. MAP ILLUSTRATING THE ITINEEAEY OF 'ey West , - '' ^ THi; ARMIES QF THE COMMONWEAL. D 2 36 Chicago To- Day. being diffused in units attracted comparatively little attention compared with the smaller numljer which was organised and concentrated in half-a-dozen central points. One very remarkable feature about Coxeyism is the extent to which it is the creature of the Pacific Slope. Browne, Coxey's lieutenant and right hand, brought the idea of a march on Washington from his experiences with Dan Kearney of the Sandlots, San Francisco, with whom he had agitated and petitioned Congress many years ago. The two most formidable armies started from the Pacific Coast — Frye's from Los Angeles, Kelly's from San Francisco. Of the other armies, two took their rise in Oregon and Montana. Coxeyism may indeed be said to be the creation of the Pacific Coast. The only important body of men not directly recruited on the far side of the Pockies, or directly inspired and directed from the Pacific Slope, was Kandall's Chicago army. But ■nlienever it can be had — he inclosed and owned by the county in each county in the State. In the other States where this is not praclicab'e, a smaller stockade for other employment must bs used. But in the newer Slates the nif^st profitable employment lew compulsory labour must remain the subjueation of wild land. Within this stockade let plain barracks be erected on the cottage plan. By proper direction all this can be done by tramp labour. Letstraw and blankets le supplied, and an open fireplace for each cottage. Only the actual necessities of shelter and comfort should be supplied for the novice who is sentenced to the barracks. The plainest and cLeapest food should be supplied in abundance, and all tobacco and liquor cut off. A uniform of duck or other material must be supplied, that all may be known by their having the same appearance everywiiere, and all other ch thing destroyed. A free bath should be supplied, and all lequired to take it. Their labour should be clearing and tilling tl e land in this inclosure by hand. Tl.eie should be no labour-saving machinery employed in a trampery, as this institu- tion iiii°bt be named. The land shall be cleareil with mattock and axe. The £cil shall be tilled with spade and hoe, as is done in England ard France to this day. This would affoid tl e largest pos>ible amount of labour within one enclosure. "'I'he sentences to the trampery should come from the county or police courts, and should be indefinite, but never for less time thin to make the cure ol trampism radical. Whenever the disorganized citizen became organised and capable of self-support and self-diiection as a free man, he could bo allowed to go on parole. But until tteu he must lose his identity, his Ireedom, and his vote, just as completely as thn man in the state prison. A system of rewards for meritorious conduct should be invented, to draw out and develop the best services and the best traits of the men. As soon as trusties could be found, they could be let out in bands of tenor twen'y to clear lands in the neighbourhood, which work on the Pacific Coast, and on both slopes of the mountains, and in parts of tbe South, is now done by Chinese labour. Within the stockade his labour could be made remunerative by preparing the wood he cuts for fire- wood, and the jiroducls he grows should be entirely for his own maintenance and support. Then he would simply be not a tax on the rest of the community, as he now is, and that, too, on those least able to bear it. Uniformed, restrained, and employed, he would bscome self-supporting, — he would cease to be a terror to the comwun'ty, and woulclno longer be a burden upon the taxpayer." The Petition in Boots. 37 even this was brouo-ht into beino- as the direct result of the presence of Kelly's Californian army m the neighbourhood. The armies recruited in the Eastern States were contemptible. There were three score pilgrims from Boston, and even fewer from Phila- delphia. Coxeyism, it cannot be too often repeated, was local to half-a-dozen states, and these at first almost without exception the furthest away from Washington. Coxey himself, with his Ohio contingent, was comparatively close to Washington. Comparatively that is. But when he unfurled the l)anner of the Commonweal of Christ at Massillon on Easter Sunday, Coxey 's men had a longer march before them than that which lay before the Pretender when in 1745 he came down from the Highlands to march on London, The roads also were probably as bad between Massillon and Washington as those which led through Preston- pans and Derby. But Coxey's base was comparatively within a stone's throw of his objective. It was far otherwise with the armies from the Pacific Slope. When Napoleon left Paris for his fatal march on Moscow, he had a shorter distance to travel than that which intervened between the Coxeyites under Frye and Kelly. The distance between Los Angeles and Washington, as Frye covered it, was further than that which stretches between London and Khartoum. When the Oregon industrials started for the capital, they had as long a road to travel as an army starting from Erzeroum on its way to London via Constanti- nople. Hence for the armies, with the exception of Coxey's contingent in Ohio, the possession of railway transport was indispensable. The petitions in boots really came to mean petitions on wheels. When the wheels stopped, the petitions were stuck in the mud. 38 Chicago To- Day. Pefcitions in l)oots are all very well when tlie distances are so short that the ])Oots will not wear out. But when they are longer than the boots will last, why then a fresh mode of petitioning must be devised ; and it was this necessity which led to the train- stealino' which forms so characteristic a feature of Coxeyism. The question as to the constitution of the armies has been much debated, but one thing stands out quite clearly. These bands of industrials behaved themselves with extraordinary moderation. If some of them occasionally stole a train, they took it as a necessity of transport. It was borrowing rather than stealing. They took the loan of the rolling stock for a time. They stole little else. No bodies of broken, landl^s men ever seem to have behaved with a more scrupalous regard for the rights of property. They begged — it may be they took collections — but no acts of robbery are reported by their enemies, nor does there seem to have been any act of violence per- petrated by the industrials. If they had been lazy tramps, vicious vagabonds preying upon society, this extraordinary absence of crime could not have been recorded. Their behaviour seems to have been exemplary. "You cannot find so much as a chicken- feather among my men," Coxey boasted, when he led his men to AVashington past hen-coops innumeral)le ; and although in some districts the fsirmers barricaded their farms when the army approached, there seems to have been no acts justifying their misgivings. From the newspaper reports and from the character of their leaders, the Coxeyites seem to lie under the imj^utation of religious enthusiasm rather than of irreligious license. Coxey and Browne are both religious enthusiasts. So is Kelly. One of the chief The Petition in Boots. 39 pre-occupatious of tlic Coxeyites seems to 1)6 preaching and singing liymns. Prayer is not so much practised amongst them. Their camps have been regulated with Spartan rigour. No toleration Avas shown to drunkenness, and the armies appear to have been singularly free from camp-followers. Poverty does not always bring chastity into its train, but the march of the industrials seems to have been unattended l)y the contagion of vice which usually marks the trail of armies. Here are the rules and regulations of the Chicago army, as drawn up by General Randall : — • All members must submit to its discipline, be orderly, peaceful, and buv- abiding. Every member must obey promptly tlie directions and orders of those who have been elected or appointed to places of authority over them. A guard will be detailed every day for the succeeding twenty-four hours of a sufficient number of meu, to be divided into three reliefs, which shall bo under command of tlie officer of the day. Every day a sufficient number of men will be detailed to act as police, to see that the camp, barracks, or other place of shelter is kept clean, and to. direct men who are thoughtless and careless about their persons to keep as clean as possible. Every man must keep his person and his immediate portion of the quarters clean, and refrain from boisterous, profane, and obscene talk, and conduct himself Iti such an orderly, sober, dignified waj^, whether in or out of quarters, as will inspire the public everywhere tliat we arc American citizens ; that we take pride in our country ; that we have a just sense of our rights under the laws of our land; and that we are banded together to make the whole people as a jury listen to our grievances. No person will be allowed in camp except members of the commonweal army and those who have permit or countersign. No speech-making shall bo allowed in camp without consent from the commanding officer. As all men in the army have joined for " pot-luck," and expect to take it, let there be no grumbling over rations or the quarters furnished to ns, no matter what the quality of the one or the inconveniences of the other. We are jxatriots, and must endure our lot, whatever it may be. We are, however, fortunately not under any necessity of inferring the nature of the Coxeyites from their general behaviour, or the rules and regula- tions of their camps. Professor Hourwich, already referred to, subjected 290 members, selected at random 40 C/)iiaov To-Day. from the men under " (leneral " Randall's command, to a close examination, and tlie results at wliicli he arrived appear to l)e decisive. The Professor, who was assisted by a sociological statistician, is satisfied that the information which he obtained w^as thoroughly relialjle. The conclusions which he published in C'hicago on May 7tli are briefly as follows : — Of the 290 industrials, one-lialf were American born ; of Ihc otlier half, tlie majority were British born. Two-thirds were English-speaking men. Tliey averaged 30 to 32 years of age. Of 2G2 industrials, 181 were skilled mechanics, representing 70 trades; 74 were unskilled, and 7 were tradesmen. The fourth were union men. Of the skilled mechanics, 70 were unionists, and 111 outside unions. Their average wage when at work was — unionists, 10s. per day, non-unionist mechanics, 7s., unskilled labourers, Gs. Of 115 questions as to education, only two were badly educated. They averaged seven years of school life ; 2G had altended high schools, business and professional colleges, acidemies and universities. Of 198 questioned as to politics, 88 were Democrnts, 39 Eepublicans, 10 Populists ; 25 did not vote, wliile 28 were not naturalised. One half the non-Chicagoan industrials were married, and had left their families in searcli of work. One-fourth of 2(31 had been helped through the winter by charity. The average duration of lack of employment was five months. Two-thirds of them had saved enough to tide them over this period, but their savings were spent. Only five or six appealed to be of questionable character. It is, therefore, says Professor Hourwdch, not the tramp, but the unemployed working man — the un- fortunate citizen — who has turned into the ranks of the Commonweal. The Coxeyites, ridiculed by the classes, have the sympathy of the masses. Organised labour, and labour not organised, has cheered the armies on their way in a fashion that fills Mr. Edward Bellamy, of "Looking Backw^ards " notoriety, with new hope. Speaking of Coxeyism, Mr. Bellamy says : — " The most significant feature of this industrial situation lies, not in the nundjers of tlie marcliing bodies — which, of course, are trifling — but in the fact that it is evident tliat the labouring masses of people, the working classes, are deeply in sympathy with it. This has been shown, us of course every newspaper reader knows, by a series of demonstrations on the part of the working-men — the poorer classes generally in the great cities, as well as the The Petition in Boots. 41 smaller districts along the line of march. It is also evidenced by the sym- pathetic attitude of the officials of the Kni,u:lits of Labour, the Federation of Labour, aud tlie Railway l!n'on in the west, and especially in their attempt to assist the armies by th(! fhreat(.'iun;;- strikt's if the latter's demands were refused. I have lieen much impres.-ied by what the woiking-meu have s lid ti me personally regarding their sympathy with the movement, and while I was prepared for a surprise, it was even greater than I expected. They evidently think it their cause, and believe that these armies are standing ibr their interests. " The contemptuous expressions from many sources a3 to tlic smallness of these armies seem to be ill-judged. The cost and difficulty of moving even 100 men across the country for 1,000 miles with no organis'^d commissariat, is simply enormous, as any old soldier will testify. Tiiat these armies have done what they have done, made the marches they have made, aud maintained the good discipline tliey have, with the resources at tiieir disposition, is an astounding fact, and will be so regarded by future historians. The phem.- meuon as a whole of the rise and cour.se of these demonstrations is significant not only of a deep discontent on tiio part of the masses with the way things are going in this country, but also of a loss of faitli in the ordinary govern- mental bodies at Washington. That this loss of faith is well justified no oiie who has followed tiie course of our national aud State legislatures fiT a number of years past can question. The government of this country, what- ever its nominal form, is in eifect the rule of the rich, and not the ride of t!io "people. So far Mr. Bellamy. Now let us follow in detail the march of the three industrial armies which have attracted most attention — those of C(^xey, of Kelly, and of Frye. When the l)lack - browed Marseillais, who knew how to die, marched across France to Paris to the strains of Rouget de Lille's immortal war-song, they passed almost unchronicled through revolutionary France. That w^as before the days of modern journal- ism. When Coxey and Browne on Easter Sunday began their famous march from Massillon to AVash- ington, there w^ere only aljout a hundred industrial soldiers in line behind the banner of the Army of the Commonweal, but this small force was escorted by no fewer than forty-three special correspondents wdth four Western Union telegraphic operators and two line men. Never in the annals of insurrection has so small a company of soldiers been accompanied by such a phalanx of recording angels. As a result 42 Chicago To-Day. every incident in tlie marcli to Washington lias been clironicled with a minuteness of detail and, let me add, with a picturesque exercise of the imagination which has seldom been surpassed. Before the march was over twenty -seven of the forty-three specials had been recalled, Ijut sixteen Avent over every foot of the road. The American reporter will sacrifice everything, even truth itself, to make his copy readable, and the pictures which they have given us of Coxey and his strange ' i'\ ^-^ ' ^^3» GENERAL LOXLY OFF 10 W^SIIINGTOX company are no doubt somewhat highly coloured. Beneath all their garnishing, however, can be dis- covered as curious a caravan on a miniature scale as ever started since the crusade of Walter the Penniless. The " hundred vaoal)onds " who started from Massillon had swollen to six hundred as the army marclied through Homestead — Mr. Carnegie's Home- stead — but when the perilous march across the snowy mountain had to be faced only a hundred and forty were found in line on the summit. The ranks were The Petition in Boots. 43 again recruited wlicn the army approached Washing- ton, but they never mustered five hundred after Homestead. What the army lacked in num1)ers it made up in the originality, not to say eccentricity, of its leaders. I met Browne at Chicago. He discoursed to me copiously and energetically upon the importance of j a{^3P{MB »iiE5S giK5 AA te'Jt.W » ^5;j^'j<^4VJ« a! a!3 B I^^ < CARL BROWNE ADDRESSING COMMONWEALERS. employing the unemployed in making good roads. I liked the man. He was full of ideas about paper money, on which I could express no opinion — a due regard for my sanity having always restrained me from the discussion of problems of the currency — l)ut I heartily agreed with him as to the desirability of utTilising the wasted labour of the community in opening up the country 1iy the construction of pass- 44 Chicago To-Day. able roads. Browne seemed to me unquestionably sincere, and he was very proud of the extraordinary cartoon which I reproduce here. He w^as even then in communication w^ith Coxey, and was much elated l)y his success in inducing the American Federation of Labour to indorse his favourite nostrum of the issue of five hundred million dollar bonds for the construction of roads. Browne was born July 4, 1849, of a fighting stock. His father had served both in the Mexican and in the Union wars. Browne himself had seen life on many sides. By turns printer, painter, cattle rancher, journalist, cartoonist, and politician, he had even more than the ordinary American facility of turning his hand to anything. He had been Kearney's private secretary, and had energetically thrown himself into the agitation against the Chinese, Like many other Americans he was mystical and much disposed to theosophy. He had acquired a strong ascendency over Coxey, so strong indeed that reporters declared Coxey was mesmerised by Browne, and was but the passive instrument of his lieutenant's will. Coxey was a younger and richer man. Born in Pennsylvania in 1854, he left school when thirteen, and went to work at a rollino- mill. He was dilio;ent, and he prospered sufiiciently to go into business on his own account in 1879. Two years later he pur- chased a sand-stone quarry at Massillon, Ohio, and in 1889 added to his other ventures that of owning a stock farm, where he bred horses, in Kentucky. Originally an Episcopalian with musical tastes, he has now become theosophist, and is said to be con- vinced that he and Browne are between them sharers in the reincarnation of Christ. Coxey wears spectacles, is married, and has six children. The Petition in Boots. 45 It would need the graphic pen of Carl}de to descrilje the motley crew which marched out of Massillon on Sunday morning, while the air was full of the chiming Easter bells. First marched a negro carrying the American banner. Then riding on a big grey horse came Browne in his buckskin coat, fringed down the sleeves and plastered with decorations. A broad- brimmed white sombrero covered his head, and round his neck he wore an amber necklace given him by his wife. iVfter him came the trumpeter Windy Oliver, the astrologer " Cyclone " Kirkland, of Pittsburg, and seven musicians of the band. Coxey himself followed the band in a buggy drawn by two bay mares and driven by a negro. In an open carriage behind rode Mrs. Coxey and her sister. The procession proper was headed by another negro standard-bearer carrying the banner of the Common- weal of Christ with its portrait of the Saviour and the suffopestive leo-end, " Death to interest-bearino; bonds !" Then followed the hundred industrials — only one hundred in the whole company. Grimy they were and ragged, but they stepped out bravely behind their banner, caring little for the jeers of the popu- lace, which outnumbered the army by twenty to one. The forty-three newspaper men tramped along- side, while the rear was brought up by a miscellaneous nmltitude, who tailed off as the snow came down and the mud grew deep in the road. Honore Jaxon, the Indian half-breed, Eiel's private secretary, was in the army, with his long l^lack hair and striking features. He was in heavy marching order, with blankets strapped round his body, an axe by his side, moccasins on his feet, and a beaded girdle round his waist. Jaxon went more lightly when the 46 Chicago To-Day. British officers hunted him across the frontier at the time of Kiel's rebellion, but notwithstanding his accoutrements he stepped it all the way, and reached Washington before the main column. Another strange figure was the Great Unknown, Louis Smith by name, who subsequently incited to mutiny in the ranks, but who at first was a potent agent in main- aOMMONWEALERS IN CAMP, taining discipline. He rode backwards and forwards alono; the column seated in his red saddle, wearins; lilue overcoat and white riding trousers, distributing badges and exhorting the Commonwealers to stand firm and not to mind the scofts and the jeers of the world. The impedimenta of the army consisted of a waggon laden with one of Browne's panoramas, wdth a cover curiously painted in symbolical colours, with The Petition in Boots. 47 a couple of commissariat waggons, on wliicli was inscribed the watchword of the Commonweal. A circus tent was carried with them, and such • rations as they could secure. As a rule the army was supplied with victuals by Xho. people on the way. The reporters complained of having ham and eggs three times a day, but they paid for their fare. The Commonwealers l^eing dependent on diarity, often went hungry. Th6y cut th^if 6wn fir6wood in the woods, made fires in camp, received their rations in groups of five, took off" their shoes, laid down in their blankets, and rested. All along the road the country- folk came to see the show. It was as good as a circus in its way — and, besides, who could say but that it might lead to better times ? So the crowds cheered, and brought crackers and pies and bacon, and the Commonwealers felt encouraged to persevere. Some- times they enlivened the camp by singing some of the Songs of the Army of the Commonweal. Of these the following sample of Lieutenant Browne's muse will probably suffice : — Air — " MarchiiHj through Georgia." Come, rally to our standard every unemijloyed mau to-da}', And show the bloated bondholders we mean just what we say ; One hundred thousand unemployed are marching in array. We are marchine; to Washimrton. Cho rus. Hurrah, hurrah, our day of jubilee! Hnrrah, hurrah, for the country of the free ; Hurrah for legal lender ! No interest bonds for me ! We are marching on to Washington. Millions of lionest citizens can nothing get to do. Desolation fills our stores, and fields and factories too ; But we are bound to drive it out, old things we'll change to new. We are marching to Washington. Corporations fret and fume and prate about their gold, Many millions now we have that can't be bought or sold; We'll have no interest-bearing bonds for black sheep in our fold. We are marcliing to Washington. 48 Chicago To- Day. Americans never can be crushed — they know their mighty power ; Tliey've waited long and suffered much ere this triumphant hour, And from the face of our fair land interest-bearing bonds we'll scour. Wo are marching to Wasliington. On tlio Capitol steps we'll stand, and there our rights demand, For non-interest bonds let every loyal citizen raise his hand, For iilen'y of money and good roads will make a hapjiy land. We are marching to Washington. On Sundays Browne preached. His sermons seem to be a strange mixture of prophecy and politics, of tlieology and finance. Over tlie head of the preacher floated a banner bearing the inscription, " The King- dom of Heaven (on Earth) is at Hand." In one of the sermons, of which a report has reached us, he declared the present condition of the country to be the fulfilment of the revelation to St. John. The horns of the beast were the seven conspiracies against the money of the people ; the ten horns were the ten monopolies, foremost among them the sugar trust. Grover Cleveland had called an extra session of Con- gress, and Ijy the aid of " that grey-headed rat from Ohio, John Sherman," had been able to heal the wounds of the seventh head by repealing the Silver Purchasing Bill. Browne is great in Scripture, and his Biblical allu- sions are quite Puritanic. Here, for instance, is an extract from one of his general orders : — • We are fast undermining the structure of monopoly in the hearts of the people. Like Cyrus of old, we are fast tunneling under the boodlers' Euplirates, and will soon be able to march under tlie walls of the second Babylon and its mysteries too. Tlae infernal blood-sucking bank system will be overthrown, for the handwriting is ou the wall. In his eyes, Coxeyism is the outward and visible sign of the second coming of CJhrist. He wrote at the beginning of the march the following exposition of his views on this subject : — - The vision of St. John is as clear to me to-day as to him when he saw it on the Isle of Patmos. All true prophecies must be on the hues of the i)ro- The Petition in Boots. 49 jection of human aftairs and human nature by one who has a kuowleJge of both by many reincarnations until reading intuition. Christ taught the "kingdom of heaven is at hand" — meaning undoubtedly, on the lines of leason, that it could come, whenever the people here willed it, through beneficent government — a co-operative system. St. John saw that it was possible for the people, some time by successive reincarnations, to reach a degree of intelligence when they would abolish usury, and the old world (custom) would pass away, and there would be a " new heaven and a new earth." And as that can only be done by legislation, it must come without bloodshed, as prophesied — by peaceable means. So if this really is the second coming of Christ, "coming as a thief in tlie night" (as prophesied), in the reincarnation of His soul in the whole people, as I feel ceilaia it now is for the first time since His crucifixion, this movement cannot fail. If it is not His second coming, then it will fail. It is plain to me that the fall of the second " Babylon " is to come true, as was the firtt, as foretold by Isaiah. What is meant by the second Babylon by the author of Kevelation is the money power of usury. The very word he uses as a prefix could not apply with such force to anything else — he is speaking of earthly things. We purpose to unite a pure State with a pure religion, both founded on reason — one in all and all in one. Here we have the familiar tone of the Fifth Monarchy man with a modern accent. Coxey writes and speaks wdth less theological fervour. But, like Browne, he is zealous against all interest-bearing bonds. The watchword of the Coxeyite agitation is " Death to the interest-bearino- bond!" Their legislative programme is not limited to the demands of the Good Road Association. They have two Bills before Congress. The Road Bill provides for the creation of a country road fund of 500,000,000 dols. to be issued in non-interest-bearing bonds at the rate of 20,000,000 dols. a month. The Bill also provides that all work shall l)e done by the day, which shall consist of eight hours, and that the lowest rate to be paid shall be 1 dol. 50 cents per day. The other Bill authorises non-interest-bearinof loans to states, territories, counties, townships, muni- cipalities, and incorporated towns or villages, for the purpose of making public improvements. Any of these authorities may borrow a sum or sums not E 50 Chicago To- Day. exceeding one-lialf the assessed value of tlieir real estate. The money is to be issued in the form of l-dol, 2-dol., 5-d()]., 10-dol., and 20-dol. Treasury notes, •which shall he full legal tender for all dehts, public and private. The Government is to retain 1 per cent, for the expense of engraving and printing. The loan is to be repaid in twenty-five annual instal- ments of 4 j^er cent. each. The scheme may or may not he absurd. But something like it would probably be adojDted at once if there were to be a rebellion or a foreign invasion ; and in the opinion of many the need of finding work for the workless is not less urgent. Europe spends every year in defensive armaments twice as much as the capital sum asked for by the Coxeyites to make roads, which are indispensal^le for the material development of the country. The chief incident in the march to Washington was the crossing of the Blue Mountains in a snowstorm. The passage was a good piece of stiff climbing, which was too much for all but 150. Of those who got throuoh Browne said in a oneneral order, "Your names will all be emljlazoned on the scroll of fame. As Henry V. said to his men after the battle of A gin- court, your names will l)e as familiar as household words." A card of merit was issued to all who made the march, in the following terms : — The Commoinvoul of Christ : This certifies that Jolni Soutlicr, of group 8* commune 1, Chicago community of the Commonweal of Christ, is entitled to this souvenir for heroic conduct in crossing the Cumberland Mountains in the face of snow and ice, and despite police persecution and dissension breeders. Their reception varied. Nowhere was it more enthusiastic than at Alleghany City, where the en- thusiasm of the populace was in inverse proportion to the hostility of the 2><>lice. The army was presented The Petition in Boots. 51 witli a new banner, bearing the following inscription in gilt letters on white silk :— Pittr^buvg ami Allegliany. Laws for Americaus. More money, less misery good roads. No interest-bearing bonds. After reaching the Chesapeake and Ohio canal, the crusaders transferred themselves to two scow\s, which conveyed them for ninety miles in two days at so much freight per ton, each soldier being averaged at 150 lb. net weight. After they disembarked they resumed their march to the Capitol. The purj^le banner of the Nazarcne floated over- head, followed by the white standard of the Pittsburg and Alleghany men ; but not for all their banners or for all their eloquence were they allowed to approach the steps of the Capitol. The mounted police broke up the procession and arrested Browne. Coxey not being recognised succeeded in reaching the steps, where however he was seized and removed. He handed his written protest to a reporter, and the first act of the great Coxeyite demonstration was at an end. Coxey, Browne, and one other of their colleagues were tried and convicted of trespassing on the grass in their attempt to make their way to the steps of the Capitol. They were fined, and ordered to be imprisoned for twenty days. The muse of history may yet find a theme for bitter irony in the outcome of this attempt of the Coxey ites to bring before the Representatives of the Republic the sufferings of the voiceless thousands of the unemployed. Imprisoned for trespass on the grass — upon which they were driven to tread owing to the action of the police in blocking the ordinary means of access to the Capitol — that was the fate of the petitioners in boots ! An old world despotism could hardly have treated the Coxeyite petition with more cynical indifference. E 2 52 Chicago To- Day The march to Washington from Massillon was child's play compared with the enterprise undertaken by the Commonwealers who started for Washington from the Pacific Slope. The distance — some three Fiom Jinlge.} SQUELCHED. [May 12, 1894. " We will present a jietition with boots on which cannot be pigeonholed." — Coxet. Ukcle Sam. — " I've got some boots on myself ! " thousand miles — was a longer walk than that under- taken by the Crusaders of the Middle Ages who started for the Holy Land, and the armies no sooner ■•' T'-"" « "? >w;^ *' general" LOUIS C. FKYE (CALIFORNIAN PIYISION), 54 Chicago To- Day. began to march than they discovered it was indispcn- sal)le they should go by rail. As they had no money to pay for their freight, this necessity led them naturally to seize railway trains. Sometimes they succeeded in inducing the railway companies to carry them. More frecjuently they seized goods trains and compelled the conductors to bring them along. But for this expedient they never could have crossed the great desert. There were two different bodies : General Frye's, which started from Los Angeles, and Greneral Kelly's, which came from Sacramento. The following is the text of the Constitution of Frye's army : — PREAMBLE. Whereas, The evils of murderous competition ; the supplanting of manual labour by machinery ; the excessive Mongolian and pauper immigration ; the curse of alien landlordism ; the exploration, by rent, profit and interest, of the products of the toiler, has centralised the wealth of the nation into the hands of the few, and placed the masses in a state of hopeless destitution. We have only to look upon the history of the past — like causes produce like results. These same causes led to the downfall of Persia, Greece and conquering Rome. The end came when two per cent, of their population owned all the national wealth. We have reached that point on our own road to ruin where three per cent, of the population own seventy-six per cent, of all the wealth. Witness the abandoning and selling of children by their parents in San Francisco, on the western shore, and the protest against the slave trafHc in cliildrcn from Italy by New York, on the eastern shore of our nation. This is one of the signs, history tells us, that preceded the downfall of all the past great nations. The daily grind of jjinching poverty, linked with the thought of a hopeless future, kills even the deep maternal iustinct. The greatest crime perpetrated by a nation is to allow her people to be idle and sink into debauched servitude. The strange tragical questions confront us on every hand — • Why is it that those who produce food ai'e hungry ? AVhy is it that those who make clothes are ragged ? Why is it that those build palaces are houseless ? Why is it that those who do the nation's work are forced to choose between beggary, crime or suicide, in a nation that has fertile soil enough to produce plenty to feed and clothe the world; material enough to build jmlaces to house them all, and productive capacity, through labour-saving machinery, of forty thousand million man power, and only sixty-live million souls to fL'ud, clothe and .slieltcr ? Recognising the fact that if we wish to es'^apo the doom of tlie jiast civilisatiuu something nuibtlie dime, iind done quickly. Therefore we, as patriotic American citizens, have organised ourselves into an Industrial Army, for the purpose of centralising all the unemployed American citizens at the seat of government (Washington, D.O.) and tender The Petition in Boots. 55 our services to feed, clothe, ami shelter the nation's needy, ami to acfjouipliali this end we make the following demands on the Government : — • 1st. Government employment for all her unemployed citizens. 2nd. The jjrohibitioii of foreign immigration for ten years. 3rd. That no alien be allowed to own real estate in the United States. CONSTITUTION. Article I. — Name. Section 1. — TJjis organisation shall be known as the United States Indus- trial Army. Section 2. — It shall have the power to make its own Constitution and Bye-Laws and elect its own officers. Article II. — How Composed. Section 1. — This army siiall be composed of American citizens over sixteen yeors of age, or those who have declared tiieir intentions to become such. Article III. — Officers. Section 1. — The officers of the army shall be a general, live aids, a quarter- master general, brigadiers, colonels, captains and sergeants. Section 2. — The general, quartermaster-general and five aids shall I^e elected by the army ; brigadier by his brigade ; colonel by his regiment ; captain and sergeant by their company. Article IV.— The General and Staff. Section 1. — The general and staff shall have the supervision over the army, and see that tlie constitution is carried out ; grant commissions to recruiting sergeants, and have power to revoke the same. Section 2. — The general and staff shall constitute a court-martial. The accused to have a right of an appeal to a vote of the army against their decision. Section 3. — Officers to hold office during good behaviour. Article V. Section 1. — Fifty men shall constitute a company; ten companies a regi- ment ; five regiments a brigade. Order op Discipline. Roll call twice a day, when pmcticablo. Drill once a day, when iiracticable. Any disoliciiienee of orders shall be sufficient grounds for expulsion from the army. Each regiment to have its own rules of order in conflict with the order of the army. Adopted at Los Angeles, Cal., March 5, 189i. Kelly's was larger and more formidable than Frye's. It was twice threatened with Gatling guns — ■ at Sacramento and at Utah. It travelled alternately on foot, by rail, and in flat-bottomed boats, which it built on the Des Moines River. It was sometimes menaced \)j the authorities, and then feted by the people. The Pacific armies said little aljout good roads. Their cry was State aid for the irrigation (jf the desert. They do not seem to have been acting 5 6 Chicago To- Day. in concert with Coxey, and General Kelly expressed himself freely in criticism of Coxey's tactics. The most notable feature about their movements was the sympathy which they commanded along the line of their march. Not even the seizing of trains and the general dis- location of railway transit could alienate the support of the masses. Mr. Sovereign, General Master Workman of the Knights of Labour, with the support of Mr. Debs, of the Railway Labour Union, threatened to tie up all the roads of Iowa if the armies were not allowed facilities across the State. The Knights of Labour and the populace generally stole a train at Council Bluffs, which they generously presented to General Kelly, who, however, refused to accept the gift. In securing that train, a son knocked his father off the engine, of which he was conductor, and helped to take the engine to the camp. Professor Bemis, of the University of Chicago, told the ministers of re- ligion in that city that if the Coxeyites were locked up, "it would be like firing a volcano." "Recent extensive tours," said Mr. Sovereign, of the Knights of liabour, " convince me that the temper of the unemployed is not to h^ trifled with and goaded by the civil authorities." The American Federation of Labour, a body corresponding to our Trades L^nion Congress, endorsed the demand for good roads. In regard to the attitude of labour toward the movement, Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labour, said : — "Tlie -working people are becoming convinced that it is the duty of a df mncratic government to see to it that every one of its citizens is given an o])poitunity to work. Coxeyisni is becoming a great eye-opener to organised labour. Tlie rich are becoming too overbearing, and with their trusts and syndicates they are squeezing the labouring classes a little too iight. It is no more than right that they should lend a little of their surplus wealtli to the government, without interest, as a bufter to the startling condition of allViirs brought about by the hai'd times. However, what I am angered most •GENERAL CHARLES T. P^ELLY, 58 Chicago To- Day. about is the position some of tlie authorities have taken in attempting to intimidate the Cose3'itcs and induce them to return home. This is alto- gether too un-Am(ricau to he thought of or tolerattd for a moment. The Coxcyites liave just as much right to petition Congress in a way that suits tliem as liave any otlier honest and peaceable American citizens."' Still more significant was the open encouragement wliicli tliey received from the governors of certain Western States. Governor Waite, of Colorado, pub- licly declared that if he were called upon to order out the militia against them, he would only order out the commissariat department. C4overnor Hogg, of Texas, roundly sided with the army against the rail- way companies. The railway which l)rought them to Texas, ought, he said, to carry them out of it, unless they wished to remain in the State. He accused the railway authorities of endeavouring to force the men to commit a crime by switching them off in the desert, where they could get neither food nor drink. If they were starved into capturing a passenger train and obstructing the United States Mail, the Federal soldiers w^ould then be called upon to furnish troops to keep the mails moving. Governor Hogg continued : — No armed force while I am governor will bo permitted to shoot down men who commit no greater offence than tramp and beg to keep from stiirving. If the?e men were violating any criminal law of oor state, I should lui- hesitatingly have them arrested and punished ; but they are not. Tlicre is no criminal law in Texas nor in any otlier state, so far as I am advised, that punishes a man or any set of men i'or taking free rides in people's carriages or railroad cars. That was tolerably strong. But the pulilic official declaration of Governor Lewelling, of Kansas, is even more simificant : — ■ o The Coxey movement is a spontaneous uprising of the people. It is more than a petition ; it is an earnest and vigorous protest iigainst the injustice and tyranny of the age. The demonetisation of silver has been the last straw upon the backs of an overburdened and long-suflfering people, and they have laken this metli(jd to ]ir(jti.'t~t and to assert their lutinhood and inde- pendence. The dei)th of this uiu\cmcnt is not eoiii])ruheudcd liy tlie politicians of the old di.spensations. It is awe-inspiring, and, believing as I do in divine interposition in the aft'airs of men, I cannot fail to see an insjjiratiou beyond mere enthusiasm, The Pctitio7i in Boots. 59 This body of men is not a mere aggregation of tramps. Some of the best blood and bone is enlisted, and the wonderful discii>line, the patient suffering, the steadfastness of purijoso all go to show that this ghost of the " Hunger Demon " will not down at the bidding of plutocracy. The followers of Peter the Hermit were a rubble of men, women, and children. Hero we see a vast army of untrained men, all under conscious and willing discipline. It is the marvel of the times, and foreshadows a change in the politics of the govern- ment of this nation. And what is more significant, the spirit of the times will demand fair play and just treatment of these men. The person or party that does them violence in this, their right of petition, will go down before a wave of public indigna- tion which has never been paralleled. Here in Kansas the people should hold public meetings and petition Congress to afford the industrials food and shelter, and give a patient ear to their demands. If this is really a govern- ment of the people, shall Congress not at least give ear to such a mighty voice ? If these men are an army of tramps and vagabonds, they are none the less representative in character ; and if the government crucible has forced the people into pauperism and vagabondage, still the people shall rule, and thus the voice of vagabondage representing the majority must and shall be heard. Here indeed is " the marvel of the times fore- siiadowing a change in the politics of the government of this nation." These Governors of Colorado, of Texas, and of Kansas represent territory covering 440,000 square miles, double the area of the whole German Empire. They were elected hj the free vote of three millions of citizens. They represent the law, they answer for order. They are the executive that must answer for order. Confronted by the advancing armies of Coxeyism, that is what they say. Nor is it only Governors of Western States who sympathise with the Coxeyites. In Chicago an army of a thousand men w^as recruited to welcome General Kelly, an unfortunate army which set out gallantly to walk to Washington and went to pieces by the way, torn by internal dissensions and maltreated by the Indiana police, who were furnished with raw hide whips for the service. In Oregon a Commonweal band seized a train, was captured, and went incon- tinently to gaol. A division of Frye's army under one Galvin seized a train in Ohio, and only surren- dered under threat of a loaded Galling. 6o Chicago To-Day. The dread lest Kelly's men would seize a train paralysed the train service on the Rock Island Rail- way, and yet when Judge Hubbard called out the National Guard to protect the railroad, the citizens of Council Bluffs hanged him in effigy, and passed a resolution intimating their desire that he should leave the city at once. A newspaper reporter at Council Bluffs, describing the state of public feeling, says : — Should tliere be a move to force the order for the army to move on or should it disband there will be trouble. The people of this city and Omaha are in sympathy with tlic Commouwcalers, as was evinced yesterday when they marched through the streets. Men cheered them on tlieir waj'', and women were crying over the sad sight of such a crowd of able-bodied men, many with families, out of employment and homeless. If they are fired on by the militia, the eeutiment is at such a pitch that Kelly and his army could be reinforced with ten thousand people in two hours. The discipline and enthusiasm of Kelly's brigade is notable. The men have slept night after night on the bare earth without blankets. " Visitors to the camp," says a reporter, " have noticed the constant and severe coughing that is going on there. Last night General Kelly gave to a sick comrade the last blanket he had, and jDassed the night on the ground. Eight men were removed from their beds on the earth this morning l)y the local hospital corps." Notwithstanding this the army pressed steadily on. Kelly sometimes made them tramp twenty miles a day across American roads in spring time, and once made a forced march of forty miles. The stories with which the American papers have been filled for the last month of the seizure and recapture of railway trains form a very remarkable chapter in the annals of modern, romance.* It is * Tiie most picturesque and romantic incident in the train stealing was the forced loan of a train that was taken by two young ladies out of sheer sympathy with Kelly's sick soldiers. The story as it is told by the official historian Vincent Is as follows : — An incident connected with tlie capture of the engine and train in the Union Pacific transfer yarcls at Coiuicjl BlujTs, April 20, waa generally overlooked at the time by the pewspapcr MISS HOOTEX AND MISS HARPER. 62 Chicago To- Day. amazing tliat so mucli train-seizing, train-cliasing, and train-captnrc could have gone on for a whole niontli with so little loss of life. A l^and of one hundred or two hundred men seizes a train, and, in reckless defiance of time-tal)les and traffic managers, steams out eastward, pursued after a time l»y another train laden with armed men ; while in front the railway company exhaust the ingenuity of their engineers in throwino" oljstructions across the line. Sometimes they tear up fifty yards of the permanent way, at other times they screw a rail across the track, but their favourite device was to create an improvised l)arricade l)y derailing a locomotive and planting it across the line. The Commonwealers never seem to run into these obstructions. They discover them in time, tear up the rails over which they have passed, improvise a short semi-circle of railway round the obstacle, and steam gaily on, leaving the obstructions behind them to impede their pursuers. After a time the forces of law and order overtake them ; they surrender ; they are sealed up without food or water in goods w^aggons, and carried off to gaol. But that coiTCsponilenis. Keily and his men were encamped at Weston, fuurleeu miles east of tbe city. 'J'Ue railroad managers and state officials had turned a d-^af oar to their entreaties for trans- portation, and tbe indignant citizens had risen en masse, as it were, to demaud that a train be providrd for tlie ariny. The demand was in vain, and when the crowd took the matter in its own hands and went to the railroad yards to steal a train, it was headed by two young women of Council Bluffs — Annie Ilooten and Edna Harper. They led tbe attack, whicli resulted in the caiUure of the enfjine, and went with the train to Westun, where they offered it to General Kelly. Kelly refused the olfer. Warran's were obtained for t'le arrest of the girls, but they escaped, and afterwards joined the army on its trip across tbe slate of loiva. They decUred their intention of accompanying the army to Washington, and a suitalile conveyauce was obtained for tliem. They were present at ths big public gathering held in the opera house at Atlantic, Iowa, on the evening of April 25, and were induced by tbe citize is to gtt upon the stage and tell tbe story of how they captured the engine. Tbey pushed llieir way to the stage, where their courage seemed to forsake them, but iinally Annie Hooten, with tie other standing beside Iier, said, in an abashed way: " You want to know how we stole the engine. Well, i will tell you how we stole the engine, though I nes'er stood up before an audience before. We heard that there were sick men at the camp at Chautauqua, and we wanted to help them. 'We were excited and did not know \Yhat to do, and then we stole the engine and ran it down to the camp, and had the sick men put aboard and hauled them back to tbe city. That is the way we stole the engine. We did not know it was wrong then, but somebody afterward told us it was wrong, so we are sorry we did anything wrong. That's how it was. We wish to thank the citizens of Atlantic for receiving the army so kindly, for you must know we consider ourselves part of the army, as we are going through to NVashingtni with it." Tb;s was received with rapturous applause, and the me* ting en led. 'I^'he Petition in Boots, 6 o in no way deters other bands from repeating tlie same manoeuvre the very next day. It is simply mar- vellous that with such a campaign going on day after day, in a dozen different states, so few men have been killed. The authorities arm their men with repeating Winchester revolvers ; many of the Commonwealers have six-shooters. Yet no one gets killed ; and all this foolino' with rollino'-stock so for does not seem to have produced a single serious accident. The powerlessness of the railways to prevent this lawless appropriation of their property by l^ands of Common- wealers so numerically insignificant is one of the most serious and sio-nificant features of the aoitation. After the arrival of the Coxeyites at Washington, there was a good deal of discussion in the press and elsewhere as to the significance of the movement. The North American Review for June pul)lishcd three articles upon Coxeyism l)y three representative Americans, all of whom take a very serious view of the movement. Major-General Howard, writing on the significance and the aims of the movement, says : — ■ The Coxey movement is imiqiie in its iucejition, different from any other in tlie history of our country, and, indeed, q^^ito unlike ordinary revolutionary experiments. Tlie attempt to affect United States legislation by organising the unemployed into peaceful hosts and marching them, without previous fnrnishing of supplies, by the precarious means of begging their way for hundreds of miles, to the Capital, appears to ordinary minds the height of absurdity. Yet notwithstanding an almost unanimous press against their contemplated expedition, notwithstanding the discouragement by members of Ccmgress witli hardly a dissenting voice, and all legal checks upon them by State and United States executive piwer, Coxey's first contingent is already in Washington, Kelly's from San Francisco at Des Moines, Ta. ; Frye's, organised in Los Angeles, Cal., is in Pennsylvania ; the Rhode Island body, calling itself a delegation of unemployed workmen, has passed New York ; and many other companies imder different designations are organising, or have already accomplished miles en route. General Howard endeavours to comfort himself l)y reflecting that Coxeyism is not so serious as the 64 Chicago To-Day. revolutionary movement in Europe, l)ut he tliinkrS that something should be done. He says : — It seems an absolute necessity that the holders of capital ami labour should cjiue to a cordial, mutual understanding; and certainly the day is not far distant when there will be a competent tribunal established by our Congress to adjust questions of difference and secure co-operation without resorting to the dangerous and costly methods of strikes and peremptory discharges. Mr. Byrnes, Superintendent of the New York police, takes an even more serious view of the situation. He says that the movement is the most dangerous that the country has ever seen since the Civil War. If there is no law to check it, he thinks that one ought promptly to be passed, for the move- ment is illegal, un-American, and odious, and should have been put a stop to long ago. Coxeyism is spreading the socialistic doctrine that the majority may be ruled by the minority ; and if it is carried out much further, the United States will fall into a chaos in which mobs will be fighting mobs every- where. He points out that the Coxeyites in Montana mobbed a United States marshal and his deputies, captured a train on the Northern Pacific and started east, compelling the railway company to clear the track in order to avoid a frightful collision. A United States regiment had to be called out to seize o them. Mr. Doty, Chief of the Bureau of Contagious Diseases, calls attention to the danger to public health that is involved in Coxeyism : — • It is easy to understand that as a means of increasing contagious diseases throughout the country, Coxeyism is an agent of the most vicious type. With the following practical suggestion Dr. Doty concludes his paper : — It seems strange that, while religious and other societies, philanthropists and ricli men, are cudgeUiug their brains to find the best metliod of improving the lowest class, the imp irtant necessity of public baths should not occur to TJic Petition in Boots. 65 them. These shoukl be built on a large scale, with every possible coaveuieuce, evea to a barber's shop, wlicre a tramp could occasioually have his hair cut and face shaved, -which luxury he is at present dei:irived of. The baths should always be opened and made attractive. When this is done, there will be fewer Anarchists found, aud fewer hospitals needed. Senator W. V. Allen, the Populist leader, thus expressed himself to the American editor of the Review of Reviews, who asked him if he were sponsor for Coxey. The Senator replied : — " Not in the least. I disapprove utterly of the marching of these indus- trial armies toward Washington, and see nothing to commend in Mr. Coxey's financial proposals. This movement is in no way connected with Populism, and the Populist party is not responsible for it. It might naturally be true that these men should look to the Populist party as the advocate of remedie,-i for the conditions out of which their grievances arise, but that is all. I look upon Coxeyism as I do upon the foam tliat accumulates upon waters that are lashed by storm. It is simply the lighter part — the floating evidence that there is commotion in the water bjneath, and that sometliing under the surface, rocks perhaps, disturbs the calm, it has no otherisignilicanee to mo It is like an unsightly eruption on the holy politic, that is symptomatic of something wrong in the system. The boil on my hand is not tlie evil, but merely the evidence that there is impurity in the blood that flows hidden in the veins. So it is with the Coxey movement. Here are a lot of fellows that are out of employment. They know that they want work. They talk more than they reason. One fellow says it is this that will give relief, ami another says it is that. There is no particular significance in their demands. Their idea in marching on to Washington is to demand that the Government should do something to aftbrd relief. But all this is only the logical cousequenc>' of those conditions of whicli I have been speaking. I have never been out t.i see the Coxey army, and have no sympathy with the movement or with its specific purposes. I had never heard of it until I read the newsimper accounts. I think it wholly visionary; but whether visionary or not, I word 1 make the same aigumeuts for the right of Mr. Vanderbilt in a peaceajjli! manner to present his grievances, if he had any, that I would make, ail have already made on the floor of the Senate, for Coxey. In this counlry m n are upon an equality of rights, and they must be treated alike. This is a far as I have ever gone in behalf of the Coxey people." Dr. Shaw, my American Editor, who visited the camp at AVashington in June, says : — I was reminded by the Coxey camp of certain romantic characteristics that pertained to some of the attempts many years ago in the West to establish phalansteries on the Fourier plan, and that have marked otlier detached projects in the line of communism. The Coxeyites had pitclied their tents around three-and-a half sides of a nearly square field, the middle of which had been converted into an excellent baseball ground. Good ball players were numerous among them, and spirited match games seemed to li:' a part of each afternoon's diversion. In the stream hard by were plenty of fish; and Chief-Marshal Carl Browne had procured seines with which it was 66 - Chicago To-Day. proposed to obtain au abuudaut supply of that kiud of food. The various squads of Commonwealers were vieiiig with each other in the decoration of their tents and booths. They were laying out ornamental flower beds, and making mucli ingenious preparation of a festive nature iu view of the approach of t!ie 4th of July. They were all comfortable, and, so far as one could learn, were nearly all of them members of skilled trades. Most of them appeared to be irom twenty to twenty-five years old. Inasmuch as the times were dull at home and they were out of work when they started for Washington, and inas- much, fiirtliermore, as they were not obliged to give support to dependent women or children, they felt at liberty to prolong somewhat indefinitely their quixotic sojourn at Washington. They were intelligent enough to enjoy the great notoriety they had attained. Tlicrc was not a sick man iu the entire camp, and not a i^article of evidence of grief or distress or crushed spirits. The leaders were probably perplexed ; but as for the men in the ranks, they were well aware that when the times improved, or the Coxey business was l]layed out, they could find work at their trades. A good many of these men were from the industrial towns of Khode Island and Connecticut, while Philadelphia was also well represented. It was evident enough that so far as anything serious was concerned, the movement had fallen completely flat. Nevertheless we have no desire to belittle that movement unduly or to refuse recognition of the fact that there are deeply serious conditions out of which it has in part come. The return of a brief season of prosperity may obscure those conditions somewhat, but may not remove them. It is the business of the statesman, the journalist, and the intelligent citizen to face these condi- tions frankly and earnestly in order that Coxeyism may not return to plaguo us in some more dangerous form. It is gratifying to believe that there is not so much distress throughout the country as there w.is three months ago. But we ought not lightly to forget how widespread and how painful that distress was through a period of about half a year. We cannot count forever iqjon the buoyancy of American conditions. The historian of the Commonweal movement, in closing his narrative in June, says : — Probably not less than twenty-five expeditions arc now on foot in as many paits of the country, while others, as at Chicago, are rapiidly organising witli a view to the strengthening of tlie prc^^eut forces. Tlie magnituilo the movement has already assumed is a matter of surprise to all, especially to those who are not in symi^athy with it. That which was regarded at first as an amusing joke has become a most grave matter to the people of the entire country. The latest reports from Washington indicate that the administrative autliorities are beginning to make ready for meeting the responsibilities' which may grow out of the gathering of the Commonweal. It is advised by the officers of the War Department that Coxey's men bo treated as free citizens, who have a right to enter the city and remain in it as long as Micy are obedient to the laws of the country. General Schofield has been directed to remain in AVashington, in anticipation of any emergency. The result of interviews with nearly fifty of the Senators, is that the Commonwealers are clearly within the law in their movement upon Washington. The health commissioner has announced that he will meet the various arrivals on the district line with a corps of assistants and examine every person, to sec that' lie is free from diecase, and upon the discovery of any contagious disorder will quarantine the entire loJy until all danger shall have passed. TJie Petition in Boots. 6^ As the result of the approach of the forces, the Capitol officials have begun to be more stringent as to admissions to the Senate gallery, permitting only such to enter as have cards of admission, and fiesh ones must be had upon each separate visit. It is stated that a similar order will prevail in the House at an early date. Woodley Park, which immediately adjoins the summer residence of President Cleveland, has been tendered to General Coxoy for occupancy by his army, and he has accepted the same ; the owner having oilered it free of charge for an indefinite period. Eeports received at police headquarters, at Washington, show that the growth of the several armies is more rapid as they converge nearer to the National Capitol, tlie aggregate nuuiberofCommonwealers being nearly seven thou.sand ; this embraces but twelve of tlie movino: boilies. The authorities quoted express the opinion that the number of the Commonwealers will swell to exceedingly large proportions, if there are no difticulties in the way of securing sufficient food at Washington. There is no likelihood of Federal troops being brought before the scene at Washington, so it is semi-officially stated, unless the local police are unable to properly handle the matter. 'I'here is undeniable evidence that the concern already expressed at Washing- ton is growing in intensity as time passes, and that the success which has followed the movements of the Commonweal up to tiie present lias afforded great encouragement to the discontented in the various towns and cities of the Union who are likely to follow in the footsteps of those who have gone before. Journalists laugh at Coxeyism. Tlie laljouring people sympathise, and in the end it is the latter who will prevail. AVe are not unfamiliar with similar petitions in boots in London. Lazarus showed his sores in Trafalgar S(|uare, and the unemployed tramped their shoes olf their feet in 1886-7, demonstrating their desire for work. London newspapers, with one or two exceptions, scofted and flouted the agitators. The metropolitan police broke up the processions and cleared the Square amid the cheers of Dives and his myrmidons. John Burns and Cuninghame Graham were flung into prison, and for a time there was peace, the peace and the silence of the grave. But in two short years London elected its first County Council, and John Burns fresh from prison became the most influential member of the new governing body. The men of Trafalgar Square became the rulers of Spring Gardens, and the greatest movement of our time in the direction of municipal socialism is being conducted at this moment in the name of the London Council 1 / r ^-•. The Petition in Boots. 69 by the representatives of the army of discontent which bivouacked at the l)ase of Nelson's Cohimn only seven years ago. There is somethins;' so abhorrent to human reason in tlie waste of the labour of a million willing workers in a continent which has not yet decent roads through its most populous districts, that everyone must sympathise with the attempt by pacific, although irregular, methods to force the subject upon the attention of \\\q, Government. Coxey may be mad, and Kelly may be visionary, l)ut America needs good roads and the arid lands of the West await irrigation. General Frye's demands are more extensive. He wants Government employment, the prohibition of all immigration for ten years, and the prevention of all aliens holding land in the United States. If a hostile power were to invade the United States, the necessity of repelling the enemy would compel the Government to find means wherewith to utilise this^ waste mass of human force in making fortifications, roads, and other indispensable necessaries of successful war. But as there is no enemy in the field save Hunger and Cold, the Government is paralysed. It has neither funds nor initiative now. So it has come to pass that these workless workers are endeavouring, more or less aimlessly, to force on a crisis that may be as effective although not so bloody a stimulant to action as actual war. They realise, do these unemployed industrials, that govern- ments when threatened with destruction by war can find at least rations for all the troops they can raise. What then if they are equally threatened by armies of industrials marching resolutely onwards to the capital ? Of the capacity of these industrial armies to place whole districts in a state of siege, there is "JO Chicago To-Day. already evidence enough and to spare. The seizure of railway trains, the suspension of traffic along whole lines of rail, the calling out of the militia, the parading of Gatling guns, the pursuit and capture of trains by United States cavalry, all this may be re- garded as but playful, somewhat tragically playful reminders that even in a free Eepublic the condition of the government going on is that men must somehow or other be fed. What will be the end of it all vvdio can say ? No prophecy can be made with any degree of certainty, excepting this, that the end is not yet. A revival of trade may postpone further develop- ments at present, but if all the lessons drawn from past history are not mistaken, Cox ey ism will in future assume much more menacing dimensions, unless, forestalling the evil betimes, the Americans decide upon adopting a policy which will give the workless something l)ettcr to do than the organising of petitions in boots. 71 Chapter III. — The Higgling of the Market — American Fashion. The ruins of Fincliale Abl)cy, on the river Wear, still remain to attest the sanctity of the north-country ascetic whose shrine it was in clays of old. In his hot youth the saint, before he became a saint, was permitted by the grace of God (so runs the ancient legend) to see a vision of Hell. The sight trans- formed his life. From that moment he abandoned his sins and endeavoured by the cruellest mortifica- tion of his body to testify to the sincerity of his repentance. When he had looked into Hell he saw that it was the Hell of Extremes. Side by side with the conventional blazing fiery furnace there was a place of intense cold, full of thick-ribbed ice, and driving hail, and biting winds, so bitter that he could not say which was worse to bear, the Hell of Heat or the Hell of Cold. But ever afterwards he sought to inflict upon himself at Finchale some foretaste of the doom of the damned. In high noon in hottest summer he would lie blistering and scorched on the heated rocks. In midwinter he would sit up to the neck in a hole broken in the ice of the frozen Wear. And when the country folk would expostulate with him as he lay baking in the sun, he answered nothing but " I have seen greater heat." In like wise when in winter they adjured the saint to come out of his bath-hole in the icy river, as the cold was too great for mortal man to bear, he would murmur, " I have seen greater cold." /- Chicago To-Day This nortli-couiitry tale comes back to me when I hear Englishmen groaning about our labour troubles. For I have been in the United States, and when I hear our labour men declaiming against the tyranny of capital, the despotism of employers, and the grievances inflicted upon workmen, I reply, with the saint of Finchale, " I have seen greater tyranny." So, in like manner, when employers denounce the violence of high-handed unionists and the unreason- al)leness of strikers, I shrug my shoulders and reply, " I have seen worse violence." For, as I have said, I have been in the United States, and in industrial matters our American kinsfolk are where we were forty or fifty years ago when rattening was the first word of an outlawed unionism and murder the ulti- mate argument against the blackleg. What Shefiield was in the palmy days of Broadhead and Crookes, before the Royal Commission was appointed whi(.'h revealed the secrets of a unionism resting upon the foundation of assassination — preached as a virtue and practised as a necessity — so Pittsburg is to-day, and when we say Pittsburg we say Chicago, Denver, or any other great industrial centre. Hence, when an Englishman returns from the United States to the worst strike region in the United Kingdom he is conscious of an immediate and unmistakable change for the better. Our difticulties are bad enough, but they are as moonliglit is to sunlight, as water is to wine, compared with the industrial feuds which rage on the other side of the Atlantic. I can best illustrate this by briefly stringing together a few of the incidents of the labour war which has been raejino- for the last month or two in the coke and mining industries of America. As my object is to describe tlie temper of the disputants Higgling of the Market — American Fashion. 73 rather than to discuss the merits of the dispute, I will not confuse the issue by details as to the points of difference l)etween the parties. Nothing is more misleading than the dissertations upon rates of wages in one country addressed to readers in another land, where no one knows anything about the purchasing value of the money discussed. It may be taken for granted in every case that the workers and their employers are at variance because they differ as to their respective shares of the profits of their industry. Times are bad in the United States ; the unemployed are numerous, and the employers, confronted by cut- throat competition between themselves, seek to cut prices by cutting wages. Against this the workmen rebel, and an industrial war ensues, which is called a strike or a lock-out, according to the sympathies of the speaker. This may be taken for granted as the ordinary groundwork of all the disputes to which I am about to refer. A very interesting article might be written describing the points in dispute and the final settlement of the great strike in the bituminous coal trade, which began in April, paralysing the industry of nearly 200,000 miners, and a far greater number of others whose work depends upon coal, l)ut for that I have no space, nor would it be so useful, on the whole, as the illustrations which I proceed to give of the mode in which industrial warfare is carried on in the land of " Triumphant Democracy." Here, for instance, is an episode culled from the newspapers, describing the strike in Mr. Carnegie's country — the State founded by William Penn on principles of peace, brotherhood, and good-will. It is interesting in many ways. It shows the ordinary methods of compulsion employed l^y strikers, the means of resistance resorted to, and the results winch 74 Chicago To-Day. follow. When tlie strike was declared, the men in several mines refused to join in the movement. They preferred to continue at work ; they had no quarrel with their employers, and they went down the mines as usual. The strikers decided that they must be brought into line. This was effected by methods hardly distinguishalile from those of civil war. The strikers organised a small Army of Intimida- tion, about 500 strong, at Union town, Pennsylvania. This army was as destitute of uniform and of dis- cipline as the first tumultuary levies of the French Revolution, but, like the sans-culottes, it had grim resolve in its heart to use the weapons which it held in its hand. The Army of Intimidation, operating from its base at Uniontown, had its plan of campaign, its leaders, and its arsenal. Its soldiers were armed not merely with clubs, according to the ancient tradition of all such irregular levies, but also with revolvers. With these they marched from mine to mine to "persuade" the men at work to join the strike. Arguments as to the holy cause of the brotherhood of labour, which might otherwise have fallen upon deaf ears, became singularly persuasive when accompanied by the click of the revolver. The mere sound of their approach sufficed in some cases to close the mines, the miners flying to the open country to escape with their lives. In other places, where they did not rightly appreciate the moral earnestness of the strikers, conviction was borne in upon them by clubbing. The Army had closed several mines in this way when the mine-owners thought it necessary to act on the defensive. As there are no police to speak of and no soldiers, the sheriff, to whom they appealed for protection, enrolled deputy sheriffs or, as we should say, special constal)les, ^^SS^'^'^^S ^f ^^^^ Market — American Fashion. 75 and despatclied them to protect life and property at the threatened mines. These deputies, armed with Winchester repeating rifles, garrisoned the mines. What followed bears a curious resemblance to the skirmishes that marked the beginning of our civil war in the seventeenth century, when Eoundhead and Cavalier in turn made sallies upon each other's strongholds, and either carried the place by a sudden rush or were beaten off after an exchange of shots with a man or two killed or wounded. The Army of Intimidation on April 4 marched from Uniontown to Fairchance, closing with violence all mines that lay on the line of march. Eainey's mines, however, they were compelled to leave working, as they were guarded by a strong detachment of deputies armed with Winchesters. At McClure's works shots were exchanged, some of which slew a Hungarian in the intimidating army. Another intimidator was shot at the Donelly and Mayfield mines which were garri- soned by Englishmen. At the Davidson Mine, a little further on, the army was more successful. They looted the works, drove the miners out, de- stroyed the engines and buildings. A shot was fired which enraged the conquerors. Bent on vengeance, they dashed up the tip, where the chief-engineer Paddock was standing. Paddock tried to escape amid a fusillade of stones and bullets. He fell shot in the back of the head. His pursuers jDounded him with stones and clubs, and then to " mak' siccar," three of them carried the bleeding body to a window^ and flung it out on to the ovens, forty feet below. The army then, glutted with vengeance and flushed with victory, evacuated the wrecked mine, and marched on. But the sensational incident of the murder of chief-engineer Paddock succeeded in doing 76 Chicago To-Day. that most difficult of all things, it roused phlegmatic and apathetic American sentiment. Telegrams an- nouncing his death were despatched all over the district, and at Connellsville, where they possess a lock-up, " conservative citizens began to talk lynch law." They did more than talk. A body of citizens, armed with guns and revolvers, started in pursuit under the county detective, to avenge the death of Paddock. After a hot chase, they came up with the rear guard. A skirmish ensued, in which the Avengers shot two of the Intimidators dead, and took eleven of them prisoners, whom they brought Ijack in triumph to the lock-up. Another batch of fifty- three were brought in later. " A large crowd gathered and loud cries went up for the blood of the captives." But they were safely housed in the lock- up. Thirty more were caj^tured, and then the presi- dent of the Miners' Association was arrested at Uniontown. Altogether 150 men were placed under arrest. The Army of Intimidation was by no means in- timidated. The same telegram that reported the arrest of the miners' 23resident added that 3,000 strikers were on the march to the Moyer works. At Broadford, two strikers were killed and one fatally wounded, " bringing the total to six men killed by bullets in one day." At night the scene in the mining region resembled a seat of war. 1 500 strikers, mostly Hungarians and Poles, encamped near Scotts- dale, and through the night the blaze of a hundred camp fires marked the bivouac of the intimidating force. Rainey's works, bristling with the Winchesters of determined deputies, were menaced by 1200 men; but ultimately it was decided to place them under guard. At this time it was computec] 10,000 men Higgling of the Market— American Fashion, 'j^ strikers were encamped for purposes of intimidation around the Rainey Mines. All this occurred in the early days of April, before the great coal strike had begun. A month later, on May 4, another ugly out- break occurred. At the Painter Coke Works in Fayette Co., the strikers stormed the place, knocked down the engineer, beat him into insensibility with heavy clubs, and were on the point of cutting off his head with an axe when they were driven back by officials armed with Winchesters. A dozen men and women were wounded before the works were cleared. Connellsville, the scene of the rally of conservative citizens a month before, was still in a disturbed state. The prompt action of the Coal Company in arming a laro;e force with Winchesters somewhat discourasjed the strikers, who, instead of attacking the works, contented themselves with marching backwards and forwards before the works displaying red flags. But although discouraged, the strikers were not cowed. On May 23, the Army of Intimidation was got together again in Uniontown, as may be seen from the following entry : — • " Nine hundred miners started at midnight of the 23rd for Stickle Hollow to attack the Washington Co.il and Coke Company's works. Several con- tingents joined tliem, making altogether 2000 men with bands, guns and c ubs. Waited for tlie men to come up from the mines, and as they appeared, Ihey summoned them to quit work. As they were doing this, tlie deputies appeared from ambush behind a car, and poured a volley into the midst of the strikers. They fled, but were pursued by continuous volleys from the deputies, who numbered seventy-five. Five strikers were shot dead, and several wounded. Deputies say the strikers also fired. " At Fairchance the Frick Company have manned their pit with arraeJ deputies." In such fashion, in the Pennsylvanian coke region in the year of grace 1894, do employers and em- ployed seek to adjust their differences. It will be said, and with justice, that the Pennsyl- vania coke district has been stuffed with foreig;n 78 Chicago To- Day. immigrants, and that it is unfair to refer to this strike as a typical American labour dispute. It is no doubt true that the most of the intimidatory armies of Pennsylvania were Hungarians or Huns, as the Americans style them, and Poles. The American Protectionist of those parts, having secured a heavy duty on all imported goods by pretending that a high tariff was necessary to enable him to pay high wages to American labour, no sooner secured his tariff than he imported thousands of Huns and Poles, on whom there was no import duty, in order to undersell the American workman. Hence the pre- sence of these foreign elements which undoubtedly contribute consideraljly to the bitterness of the industrial w^ar. An ugly illustration of this occurred at Detroit in April. A wages dispute between the Detroit municipality and their workmen led to an attack by 700 Poles upon the sheriff and his deputies, which resulted in the killing of two men and the wounding of fifteen others. The sheriff himself w^as almost killed. He was knocked down and hewed at with pick and shovel on his head and body. An artery in the leg was severed, and he w^as not expected to live. But although it would be a mistake to debit all the outraoes to the foreigner's account, there is no doubt that he is always an element of danger. This comes out very clearly in the history of the great coal strike, wdiich was declared on April 11. The struggle in the bituminous coal trade attained the dimensions of a national dispute. The States involved were sixteen in number, but the chief seats of the strike were in Illinois, Ohio, Indiana, Pennsyl- vania, and West Virginia. Of 189,000 miners, 178,000 came out on strike, voluntarily or other- Higgling of the Market — A^nerican Fashion. 79 wise. The Union ordered a universal strike. Mines that were working at Union rates were hiid idle equally with those where reductions had been made. " The fio;ht for livino; waoes is a general fio-ht, and no local settlements will be authorised or recognised/ was the dictum of President McBride. Until a general settlement has been declared, " coal must not be loaded at any price, or for any purpose." Naturally many miners who were working at Union rates did not see the sense of coming out. Hence the necessity for the tactics which were employed, and very generally employed, to enforce obedience to the orders of the Union. The following are a few of the incidents in the course of this strike extracted from a diary compiled from the Cliicago Herald : " April 23. — Mob of 1500 miners marclieJ to La Salic, 111., to prevent tl.e miners working. A riot ensued. Most of the men carried revolvers stilettoes, and daggers. '• 200 miners crossed over into Western Virginia from Ohio, and forcibly took the men from llie pits. "April 26. — Acting-Governor Gill ordered out five companies of tlm Chicago Militia to be in readiness to protect the mines. The miners march - iiig on La Salle had seven brass bauds, a drum and five corps, and sev( n commissary waggons. 100 teams of people followed them, making a pro- cession three milts long. "April 27. — 3000 miners, chiefly foreigners, marclud into Te'uka, II., carrying pistols und clubs, and armid with dynamite bombs. They came in six divisions of 500 men each. Tlie coloured miners work; the Unions do not protect the blacks, who are denied admission to the Unions. The miners Were persuaded away from Teluka. '•Mayo. — Mcsaba Iron Company, fifty-eight, mostly Finns, secured ex- ]ilosives, with the avowed purpose of blowing up people in Virginia, Minn., ^and the neighbourhood. "At Peoria, 111., 600 miners, armed with clubs, and followed by twenty- ilive carriages, compelled several mines to close. " Finns ugly at Virginia, Minn. lUOO strikers met the regular troops, ^'ho had been called out, at the depot. " May 5. — Strikers shot by Marshal Free at Mountain Iron, Minn. Twenty minutes after the Marshal left the town a mob of 500 strong, armed 'with crowbars, axes, Winchesters, and ropes, took possession of the place. "May 6. — The Coal Company at Stanton, 111., received a consignment of ■arms. A fence built round the collieries, and other fortifications made in anticipation of trouble. " May 7. — At Birmingham, Alabama, 200 fatiikers Went to Price's mine. 8o Chicago To- Day. Put dynamite under the boiler and engines, and blew them up, tlien destroyed the property of the mining company. They then marched on, blowing up a car loaded with timber on their way. They let the other cars down a hill, and wrecked them. "May 11. — The strikers at Pana, III., broke into the powder house, filled sections of tlie ga.s-pipe with powder, and then exploded it under the windows of the working miners. Notices, 'If you don't quit work it will be murder,' jjosted over the town. " May 12. — At Oskuloosa, Iowa, 500 strikers, with brass band and leaders on horseback, marched in double tile, ordered the American Coal Company's men out. " May 20. — At Birmingham, Alabama, a mob of strikers went to a miner who refused to come out. As he tinfastened the door they fired a volley, riddling him with bullets. He died instantly. The mob then entered the house, firing right and left. " May 21. — Strikers. 200 strong, each carrying a heavy club, called at all the smaller mines at Danville, 111. They said, 'Now, you fellows, look out ! A f ter this no more talk goes. We will fix you if you take auother pound of coal out.' All the tools in Beard's mine were stolen, aud thrown into the Vermilion River. The tools and cars at another mine were dectroyed, and the track torn up. "At Breeze 250 miners arrived, with two waggons and provisions and teacs, and camped near the West Mine, to see that no one went to work. "At Stanton, the Consolidattd Coal Company ordered a shipment of Win- chesters, 100 shells containing 5 draclnn.s of powder nnd several oiinces of shot, all that could be had at St. Louis. A like shii)ment ordered from Chicago. The Citizens' Defence Organisation is orgauis.d in squads, each under its leader. Drilled daily. " May 23. — GOO strikers on their way by train from Missouri to Leaven- worth, Kan., to induce 800 miners, whose wage.s were increased, to join the strike. Alarm bells will be sounded; 500 citizens witii arms will meet the bJuritfat the Court House, and receive strikers. "At Puna, 111., 800 men are at work in the mines : lOOOstrikerd massing in the district to turn them out. The Coal Companies received shipments of levolveis, Winchesters, and ammunition. Guns kept in the mine. IMincis uU aruK'd aud pnpared. Citizens organise to defend the miners. "At Danville, 111., 1000 strikers compelled 200 men to leave work and join the strike. The 1000 miners were armed with knives, pistols, and clubs. They also had a covered waggon filled with rifies. Principally Hungarians, with bottles of whiskey in their pockets or in their hands. The sheriti' had only 35 deputies. The deputies collapsed. "At Evansville, Ind., 200 strikers attacked 30 workers, severely beating an 1 b uising the non-Unionists. The strikers came with waggons laden with provisions aud Winchester rifles. After a fight, in which two men were kilkul and five wounded, the mine was shut down. The strikers camped at its mouth, supplied with six weeks' provisions and firearms. " At Pana, III., 500 strikers threatened to kill the men engaged in putting out the fires in the mines. Striker arrested and liberated from prison by tin; mob. "At Kangli, near Streator, 111., 30 ttrikers attacked six workers. The m;inager fired on them, whereupon the strikers hunted them into the wooils, threw the boiler and engine down the pit, and smashed everything they could. " May 24.— At La Salle, III., Sheriff Taylor, while protecting the County Higgling of the Market— -American Fashion. 8i Gabon Coal Compaii}', was attacked by several hundred strikers with revolvers, stones, &c. Tlie sheriff, two deputies, and five miners were wounded. Many arrests made. Telegraphed for militia. 500 miners, armed and organised in Spring Valley, marched to release prisoners. Sheriff removed in closed carriage to escape murder. "At Pana the Citizens' Protective League of 600 members organised. 2000 strikers threaten to attack. Injured the electric light plant. Town in darkness. Preparations made to receive them with tliree volleys fiom a thousand Winchesters. " 250 strikers, with pistols, knives, and clubs, marched from the neighbour- ing mines to Caiterville. Superintendent of police, supported by a crowd armed with Winchesters, rifles, muskets, and pistols, leave Carbonville for the scene of action. " May 25. — At L i Salle six companies of the National Guard encamped on tiie hills. 600 strikers attack, but are driven back with fixed bayonets. Militia occupy a position of great strategic strength. '•At Stanton, III., the last of the forty-eight mines of the Consolidated Coal Company closed as the forces at the disposal of the Company inadequate to protect mine. Train derailed by strikers near Mount Olive. " 200 strikers on their way to Ottawa, 111., hunt miueis from Gorfat mine, burn waggons, tools and clothes, knock in props at the main entrance, pits cave in. Every road leading into Ottawa is now picketed with heavily armtd men. If the strikers approach, fire bells will be rung and hundreds of citizens will rally with rifles and shot guns. " Miners congregate at Pana, lud., from all sides. 2000 from the Soutb, 1000 North. 300 deputies, composed of the bist citizens, bankers, merchants, journalists, &c., prepare to receive them. 700 men still at work. "At Birmingham, Ala., 700 State troops ordered out. " At Brookside strikers try to blow up a water main, were fired upon, six wounded. "May 26. — At La Sallo at ten o'clock at night five explosions heard. An attack expected, but nothing occurred. "At Lad, 111., 400 drunken armed strikers seized Burlington fieiglit train and came on to Spring Valley towards La Salle. Six companies of troops marched out to capture train. They had their sides ' bulging' with ball- cartridge. Dis2)ersed the strikers, capturing three prisoners. Police report that the strikers have thousands of pounds of dynamite. Mino owners unable to account for fully ten tons. None of the local papers publish the news, the La Salle Tribune saying that if anything appeared reflecting upon the foreign element they would be blown up with dynamite. Governor Altgelt all day receiving telegrams for troops, arms, ain] ammunition." Until the middle of May the tactics of the strikers had been chiefly confined to intimidating non- Unionists and closing mines by force. The last weeks of May saw a new and very serious develop- ment in the shape of a blockade of the railways. No one who has not been in America can adequately realise the extent to which civilisation is an affair of G 82 Chicago To- Day. railroads. Railways in England were conveniences of communication. In the United States, especially in the Western States, they were necessaries of existence. The miners' strike, by creating a coal famine, threatened society with a danger which was enor- mously intensified by the action of the miners. Finding that, notwithstanding all their efforts, some mines continued in operation, they decided to institute a coal blockade of the railways. Their leaders repu- diated the policy, but it was none the less carried out. Gangs of miners encamped upon the main lines of railway in Indiana and Illinois, piled railway tires across the track, and compelled every train to pull up for examination. If there was no coal on board, it was allowed to proceed. If there were any coal cars, they were side-tracked or ditched before the rest of the train was permitted to pass the obstruction. Here are a few entries relating to this portentous development of industrial war : — - " May 25. — At Evansville, lud., the strikers stopped coal trains. " At Slielburne, the strikers will allow no more coal to pass. " At La Salle an Illinois Central freight train was wrecked by strikers piling railway tires on the rails. It was intended to wreck the express train, becaiTse the Illinois Central was using coal from the La Salle shaft. English- speaking strikers unable to control the Russians, Poles, and Belgians. " Thirty car loads of coal side-tracked, on the East Illinois Eailway at Lifford, lad., by the strikers. " At Minonk, 111., the strikers decide to stop coal on the Illinois Central. " May 26. — At Brazil, Ind., strikers capture a car of coal, side-track it, and leave it in charge of fifty women. "May 27. — At Minonk, 111., 200 miners, Poles, Belgians, and Hun- "■arians, encamp at junction of Saute Fe and Illinois Central. Only trains without coal allowed to pass. Bonfires are blazing at the crossings within a block of the sherilf's headquarters. " May 28. — Two humlred militiamen arrive and go into camp. Tliey form up on either side of the junction at IMiuonk, so as to allow a coal train heavily guarded with deputies to pass. A man attempted to alter the switcli, and was fired on by the deputies. " Miners at Wenona, 111., chiefly Poles, placed rails on the track, and pre- vent the passage of any coal train. The sherift"at first powerless to prevent them. But at night he fired on the strikers, and dispersed them. The miners pulled out the pins from the couplings. Higgling of the Market — American FasJiion. S3 "At Mount Olive, 111., the strikers tore ui) the Sladdisou Coal Company's track, and destroyed the line. "May 29.— At Mount Olive, 111., the Chicago exjiress was almost wrecked by obstructions placed oa the line by strikers. " At Yellow Creek, O., miners attempted to board the night express. The sheriff, however, with over fifty deputies, guarded the train, and beat them back seven times before the train could start again." So ruthless were the miners that it was with the utmost difficulty j)ermission was secnired for the miners to extinguish a fire which broke out in Sprino- Valley mines. The English-speaking miners rushed to put the fire out ; the foreign element resohed upon letting them burn. Permission was refused to the town of Des Moines to obtain the coal necessary to keep the city waterworks going. The Illinois Lunatic Asylum at Kankakee, in which were 1100 inmates, ran short of coal. To save the miserable lunatics from perishing of cold, the strikers at first permitted them to have some coal ; but, on second thoughts, strike policy triumphed over humaner considerations, and the permission given on the 21st was rescinded on the 29th. Per contra, permission was given to McBride, the president of the strikers, and also a Ijrewer, to obtain coal for his breweries, where he had 15,000 dollars' worth of beer which would have spoiled if no coal could have been procured. * The state of latent civil war which these industrial disputes bring to the surface was most vividly illus- trated in the strike among the gold and silver miners * The Chicago Herald, dixitiA June 7, has the following headings: "Twj miners shot. Deputies guarding the Ohio Kiver Bridge tire into anapproacii- ing party. Besides those killed, four of the strikers are wounded in the fusillade. Twelve hundred State militiamen ordered out by Governor ]\IcKinley to quell the riotous workmen. Lawless bands are stopping trains, and defying officers. Other conflicts expected." That relates to Ohio. The news from Indiana is as follows : " Fighting in Indiana. Fusillade near Farmersburg. Engineer stoned to death by miners. IMartial Law proposed." Ilinoisisno better: "Killed in a riot. One man slain and three fatally wounded in a fight with strikers near Peoria. Desperate gang charL;es a barricaded mine. The invading army applies the torch, and destroys pioperty Avorth 30,000 dollars." ' "" G 2 84 Chicago To- Day. of Colorado. The dispute began about the eight-hours day. The miners were working nine hours. They demanded an eight-hours day, with three dollars wage. The owners offered them a day of eight-hours and twenty minutes. This the men rejected, and then added to their original demand a claim to be allowed to elect their own superintendent, or, as we should say, manager. This being clearly inadmissible, the strike was declared. In recounting the incidents of this local struggle, it is difficult to believe that we are writing of an indus- trial dispute. The whole story is one of war and of the incidents of war. We read of forts and cannon, of Gatlings and of AVinehesters, of revolvers and of dynamite, of cavalry and militia, and even of the formal exchange ()f prisoners of war. AVhen the strike was declared 1200 miners in the neighbourhood of Denver, Colorado, withdrew to the level summit of two hills named respectively Bull Hill and Battle Hill, and there they threw up two regular forts, wliich they armed and provisi(jned for a siege. Bull Hill is descril)ed as a lofty peak commanding the whole country. The top is quite level, and several mining towns are within artillery range of the fort. It is well supplied with food, giant powder, dyna- mite and ammunition, Ijut report was doubtful as to water. From this position of vantage the miners made war upon the mines in their vicinity which continued at work. The manner of their warfare may be gleaned from the following extracts from the diary of the campaign : " May 24. — At Cripple Creek, Col., seveuly deputies left to guard the uiiues at Victor, lour miles distant. Twenty were surrounded and disarmed by the strikers. Twenty-three reached the Independence mines, where they were surrounded next day by 300 strikers. The alternative was oifered.them Higgling of the Market — Avicrican Fashion. 85 of surrfendering, or to be blown up with giant powder which was enclosed iu beer caslcs with fuses attaclicd. Tliey surrendered. " May 25. — One hundred and twenty-five deputies came from Denver to Cripple Creek. They found the shaft-house blown up with giant powder, macliincry ruined and sliaft-house burned. Tlic deputies fortified themselves with timber near the railway track awaiting attack. Strikers have 400 Wincbesters and 800 revolvers of an improved pattern, with abundant ammunition. "May 26. — At Denver, Col., seventj^-five strikers at early dawn stole a construction train, and coming upon a bridge guarded by seven deputies, a finht began in which two men were killed and several injured. Governor Waite ordered out the entire militia of the State, including the light artillery, with Gatling guns and smooth bores. The deputies, 350 in number, have a cannon. Miners threaten to hurl dynamite down upon the deputies. "May 27. — President Calderwood of the miners proposes an exchange of prisoners. Miners had cajjtured the superintendent of the Spring mines and two men, holding them as hostages. Six hundred armed deputies with two Gatlings have arrived. " May 28. — The miners at Cripple Creek descended from their fortress and raided two towns for firearms and hostages. They have placed pickets round their camps and refused to allow strangers to pass the lines. A miner had his horse shot under him for not halting when summoned." Heavy firing occasionally was exchanged between the miners and the deputies, but to little purpose. At last, on June 4, the deputies, with a Parrott and a Gatling gun, decided to storm the strikers' camp. But what would almost certainly have been a bloody and desperate battle was averted l^y the Governor of the State. He undertook to mediate between the miners and the deputies, and the quarrel was ulti- mately arranged, the miners undertaking to give eight hours' full work, exclusive of twenty minutes for lunch. It is a melancholy and an alarming record. The mere l^rute violence which is everywhere rampant is bad enough, but that is, Ijy no means, the worst feature of the story. What is far more appalling is the utter paralysis of public and moral authority. Arbitration neither side appears to have thought of. The public contented itself with keeping a ring, watching with pitiless curiosity the comltatants worrying themselves to pieces like wild beasts in the S6 Chicago To- Day. arena of the Colosseum. So far as can be seen from the American papers, the Christian Church made no effort to compose this fatal strife. Where moral authority is not, resort to Catlings and dynamite seems to many the only alternative. The great mischief in America is the absence of trust, the rooted disbelief in the honesty and good faith of anybody. Rightly or wrongly, American workmen seem to be convinced — I have heard picked leaders of American labour assert it again and again — that no award, no agreement is ever respected by their employers a day longer that it suits their interest to keep it. Bad faith on the part of the employers is balanced by murder and outrage on the part of the employed, while the Church, which should be the conscience of the community, is seared as with a hot iron by a conventional indifferentism to the affairs of this world. The Pope, in his famous Encyclical on Labour, laid down doctrines which all Christian Churches every- where would do well to lay to heart. But nowhere is there greater need of the preaching and the teaching of that sound doctrine than in the United States to-day. " Blessed are the peacemakers, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven," does not seem to offer sufficient inducement to Christian men to compose these industrial feuds. Perhaps they will wake up to a sense of their duty and their responsibility, when they discover that the failure to make peace not merely forfeits the kingdom of Heaven, but inevitably turns the kinodom of this world into a kino;dom of Hell. 87 PART IT. Just Before the Battle. Chapter I. — The Seat of War. Chicago is tlie only American city which has had anything romantic about its recent history. The huihl- ing of the city, and still more its rebuilding, are one of the romances which light up the somewhat monoto- nous materialism of Modern America, Its surprising growth is one of the wonders of the nineteenth century, although it is not so great as the growth of London. More than thirty years ago a young Kaffir who had visited London described, on his return to South Africa, his impressions of the city. He said that London, the great place of the English, was greater than all the great places of other countries. " Their cities," he said, "are like children to London. Paris is large and so is Berlin, but London is the mother and could hold one in each arm." As the Kaffir said of Berlin and of Paris, so I may say to-day of New York and of C-hicago. They are great places, but they are as children compared with London ; London is the mother, and she could hold one of them in each of her arms. The popu- lation of Chicago is 1,400,000, and the population of New York 1,800,000, while that of London, at the census of 1891, was 4,200,000. The two great cities of America rolled into one are not equal to the great Babylon on the Thames. London, the Americans will 88 Chicago To- Day. be prompt to reply, has had a thousand years in which to grow, whereas Chicago is but the seedling of yesterday. That is no doubt true. In the year 1812, when the Pottawatomie Indians massacred the white inhabitants of fort Dearborn, three years before the battle of Waterloo, the population of London was about a million. Eighty years ago, Chicago started with nothing, whereas London had a million of in- habitants. In the eighty years which have passed since then, London has added to her population three millions, whereas the total population of Chicago to-day is barely half that number. So far as the building of a new city is concerned, London has beaten Chicago twice over. The only difference is that, whereas Chicago started with nothing, London had a huge nucleus of a million inhabitants. Still the fact remains, that in the 688 miles composed in the metropolitan police district, three millions of people have come to live in 1894, which is as much a new population as that which is to be found in the city on the shores of Lake Michigan. This is a very remarkable fact, look at it how we please. There is nothing which the visitor hears more constantly in Chicago than the assertion that great allowances must be made because of the newness of the city. Seventy years ago, you are told, there were only a few log huts upon the site of the present city, where you, to-day, have a population rapidly mounting up towards two millions, for whom it was necessary to create houses, streets, railways, and all the necessities of civilised existence. That is, no doubt, true ; Init it is equally true that London has had to create in the same period houses, streets, railroads, and all the appliances of civilisation for twice as many people as those which inhabit Chicago. New London — that is CHICAGO AND ITS VICINITY. 90 Chicago To-Day. to say, tlie city which has come into existence outside the old London of 1812 — is twice as great in mere numl)ers and many times greater in other things than the city of Chicago. Therefore, even in the phe- nomenal aggregation of population within the lifetime of a single individual, London has no reason to fear comparison with Chicago. The growth of London is even more remarkable than that of Chicago, because Chicago started with no dead weight in the shape of a debased, pauperised, and degraded class such as has swarmed from times immemorial in the slums of London. The builders of the new Babylon on the Thames which has sprung up around our capital had not the immense advantage of virgin soil and a territory upon which the city builder could lay out his plans as he pleased, without fear of vested interests other than those of the prairie wolf and the wandering Indian. The result has been that our English Babylon is not so much a building as a growth. Chicago is laid out in regular parallelograms, a city made by the surveyor and the architect, who, with practically unlimited space in which to build, have mapped out the city with a carpenter's rule, with straight avenues running north and south, intersected at right angles by equally straight streets running east and west. Li the blocks made by the intersection of these thoroughfares, the citizens reside in dwellings planned out with something approaching to the geometrical monotony of a honeycomb. Li London there is nothing of this. From the parent stock branches have been thrown out in all directions, and it would be as idle to attempt to reduce greater London to mathematical exactitude as it would be to rule straight the branches of an oak-tree. North and south, east and west, the great umbrageous The Scat of War. 91 growth of the city has spread, covering whole counties with its shadow, and lacking, until quite recently, any common centre, or any consciousness of civic existence. In this, Chicago had advantage of London. Far more than any city, excepting Paris, Chicago has a civic consciousness. Londoners live in London, but Chicagoans both live and believe in Chicago. The city has become to l^e, in a kind of a way, a substitute for a deity. \\\ this the Chicagoans resemble the ancient Eomans, whose devotion to their seven-hilled city was even greater than that which the Chicagoans pay to the city which they have reared on the level marsh on the edge of Lake Michigan. There is some hope that the London County Council may succeed in creating a more vivid sense of civic consciousness in the heteroo-eneous cono-lomeration of humanity which looks up to the civic Parliament at Spring Gardens. But that is still to come. Chicago spreads over nearly 200 miles of territory. The area patrolled Ijy the Metropolitan Police is 688 sc[uare miles. But, whereas the builders of the new London have paved their city and made it habital^le, the greater part of Chicago is still half- baked. One of the most interesting pictures of Chicago of to-day is contained in the report of the postmaster of the city. He contrasts the difficulties of postal service in Chicago with those which exist in the eastern cities, and points out that of the 2400 miles over which his carriers have to deliver letters, 800 are unpaved. An unpaved street means that in winter the houses stand on the edge of strips of morass, while in summer they are swept with dust storms which would facilitate the acclimatisation of the citizens in the desert of Sahara. So at least they say, for as I was not in Chicago during the summer, 92 Chicago To- Day. I can only speak of tlie dust at second hand. Tlie Windy City, however, has an unenviable pre-eminence in this respect. As it is with paving, so it is with sewage. The mayor mentioned to me casually that there was an area within the city limits of ten square miles in which a hundred thousand people were living, and which had no main drain. It will probably remain without one until an epidemic of cholera or of typhoid forces the necessity of sanitation upon the inhabitants. The side walks in Chicago are for the most part made of wood. There are 3000 odd miles of side-walk constructed of wood, 241 of stone, and 333 of concrete. Almost the only natural obstacle in the city which interferes with the regularity of the streets is the Chicago Eiver, a narrow but extremely useful inlet of the lake, which winds its way through the heart of the business portions of the city, and necessitates the construction of no fewer than 54 bridges and three tunnels. This river Chicago has succeeded in polluting as foully as London polluted the Thames. Lake Michigan, into which the sewage of the city flows, is also the source of the water supply, the water being pumped from intakes situated four miles from the shore. This arrange- ment, however convenient, is only temporary. A great canal is now in process of construction, which will conduct the sewage of the city overland until it reaches the Mississippi Eiver, when it will be finally deposited in the Gulf of Mexico. Notwithstanding these drawbacks, the health of Chicago is exception- ally good. The death-rate is one of the lowest of any of the great cities on the American continent, and is frequently as low as, or even lower, than that of London. The numerous open spaces and the wide streets make it impossible to keep out the fresh air The Seat of War. 93 from the prairies on one side and the Lake on the other, and the fact that the city has been peopled by the healthiest and most adventurous members of every race, tends to give it an enviable pre-eminence among American cities, and counterbalance its natural disadvantage of being situated on a marsh. The last day I was in Chicago, I ascended the Auditorium Tower, which may be regarded as the Chicago substitute for the dome of St. Paul's C^athc- dral. The Auditorium Ijuilding, with its observatory THE AlDlTOaiUM UOTEL. tower, is about one of the ugliest pieces of architecture which was ever reared, either in the Old World or the New. There is a tendency on the part of archi- tects in the New World to imitate the Aztecs in the huge savage clumsiness of their edifices. It would, however, be cruel to hold the Aztecs responsible for the monstrous hulk of hewn stone from which the weather man keeps watch and w^ard over the Lake Shore City. It was a dull day, although the air was bright and keen. There was sunshine on the lake, which brouoht into all the more vivid contrast the 94 Chicago To-Day. murky, wreathing pall of smoke which covered the city. Chicago, unlike its eastern rivals, burns a soft coal which produces even more smoke than that which is vomited forth from the innumerable chimneys of London. On one side there stretched, as far as the eye could see, a vast expanse of bright blue water, unflecked even by a single wreath of smoke, while on the shore stretched inward, as far as the eye could reach, there was nothing but a confused chaos of chimneys of factories and dwelling-houses belching forth smoke which the wind seemed unwilling to carry away, but which coiled among the roofs of the houses, and concealed from view all but those immediately below. It seemed as if all the Kingdom of Heaven lay stretched out on one side, while on the other was the smoke of Tophet. London has no such dark canopy of smoke as that which broods over Chicago. London, of course, has its fogs. Therein we enjoy a pre- eminence in discomfort and gloom in which we have no rivals. A light grey fog settled down on Chicago shortly after I came to the city, and the papers were good enough to say that a London fog had been laid on for my special benefit in order to make me feel at home. It seemed to make them uncomfortable, but it was no more a London fog than a London office building is a Chicago sky-scraper. It was a tolerably thick, grey, misty fog, in which it was somewhat difficult to find one's way, but it did not bear even the remotest resemblance to the Egyptian darkness w^hich often shrouds London streets in sulphurous gloom. Two- thirds of Chicago is built of wood. That, in itself, is sufficient to make a great difference between it and any English city. There are spacious boule- vards of villa residences built of solid stone, but even in the heart of the city, side by side Avith eighteen The Seat of War, 95 and twenty-storied buildings, are to be found wooden shanties, as if to emphasise, by way of contrast, the difference between the old city and the new. From the point of view of the city builder, Chicago holds a unique place. Long ago she found it neces- sary to raise the level of her streets, and then com- pelled the houses to follow suit. Chicago not merely hoisted huge edifices into mid-air in order to build in one or two stories, but she put her houses upon wheels and trundled them along her streets, and this she did not merely with wooden shanties, but with houses of brick and stone. Her latest triumph has been the adaptation of iron to the work of building and the universal use of the elevator, which enables people to live nearer the stars than mortals have ever done before with ease and comfort. These immense sky- scrapers of twenty and twenty- two stories are singu- larly lightly built. They are indeed little more than so many Eiffel Towers, enclosed in veneering of stone or terra-cotta, but standing four-square to all the winds that blow, and yielding less to the violence of the blizzard than the ordinary three and four-storied houses. As Chicago is built on a marsh, there is no natural foundation on which to rest these hua-e edifices, and therefore it is necessary to build them on artificial foundations of railway iron and cement, spread on the ground some forty or sixty feet below the surface of the soil. From this iron and cement foundation a framework of steel is built as high as the building regulations of the City Council will permit. AVhen the slender masts of steel are run up to the requisite height, they are fastened together by girders, and then the ingenious builder begins putting on his veneer of marble, brick, or stone. As each story is finished the outside casing rests upon the flange of 96 Chicago To- Day. the girder, so that there is nothing to hinder the work going on at each story at the same time. One of the first sights I saw in Chicago was the building of one of these sky-scrapers from the top downwards. Tlie buildings when completed are sometimes as ugly as sin, and resemble nothing more than huge packing cases pierced with windows. In other cases, however — notably in the Woman's Temple and the Columbus Memorial Building — they have rather an attractive appearance. Under the roof of a single building are domiciled whole colonies of industrious human ants : lawyers, doctors, dentists, business men of every de- scription, are all to be found next door to each other, and the elevators are continually flitting from the roof to the basement. The Masonic Temple, the tallest of the tall buildings of Chicago, requires the service of fifteen elevators, and even if the city regu- lations did not forbid the carrying of the l)uildings much higher, they would be limited by the fact that as they require two elevators for every three stories, if you were to carry the buildings much higher, the whole of the space would be taken up with elevators, and none would be left for use as oflices. The larger buildings are all heated throughout by radiators, which are regulated l)y electricity. Thermometers are fixed in every room, and the moment the tem- perature falls below a certain numljer of degrees the heat is turned on at the radiator, and continues until the temperature is raised and the thermometer de- taches the electrical arrangement and the heat is shut oftl These radiators are in use night and day. The system of telephone service, expensive but in- dispensable, enables the citizens to overcome the obstacles of distance which intervene between their residences. All the business of the town is crowded The Scat of War. 97 togetlier in the centre of the city, where this gigantic ant-heap of humanity transact the business of half the continent. This congestion of popuhition in the l3usiness quarter, and its wide diffusion over nearly two hundred scjuare miles on property which lies within the city limits, brings to the front the problem of rapid transit, of street railways and elevated roads. All American cities are more or less confronted with the same proljlem as Chicago. In New York, which has both cable cars and elevated roads running the whole length of the Island, to say nothing of the limitless water transit on either side, they are pro- posing to construct a new elevated railroad which will whirl the citizens at express rate through mid-air, and at the same time they are proposing to dig and hew an underground railway through the heart of the rock on which the city stands. Chicago has no water transit worth speaking of, for they have not yet utilised the lake as a means of communication between north and south. The immense width of its streets, which in some places are almost a Sabbath day's journey across, naturally suggests street railways, and so far as the outlying districts are concerned the street-cars and the elevated railways which are con- structed, or in process of construction, solve the problem. The chief difficulty, however, is in the heart of the city, where the traffic is congested, and where all the lines north and south and west meet and centre. Many ingenious methods have been suggested — underground electric railways, although they would have to be borne through bog, and would have to avoid the foundations of the sky-scrapers which reach some forty or sixty feet below the surface of the ground ; and another proposal which is peculiar to Chicago, in the shape of circulating sidewalks. It H 98 Chicago To-Day. is an adaptation of the idea of the elevated railways, the only difl'erence being that the whole roadway circulates at varying rates of speed. The platform, of course, is stationary ; then you step on a second roadway which progresses at the rate of three miles an hour, from this you step upon another roadway which is going at the rate of from five to six miles an hour, and you then take your seat on yet another, which is circulating at the speed of eight miles an hour. You go through the same gradations in reach- ing the stationary sidewalk from which you descend to the level of the street. The scheme at present is only on paper. It is doubtful whether its promoters will be able to overcome the opposition of the property holders and residents on either side of the streets, who have no desire to see this circulating platform running over the level of the street on a line with their first-floor windows. At any rate, its construc- tion would probably be postponed until some arrange- ment has been come to by the railroads, and the street railroads combine so as to provide a common centre and interchange of fares between all sections of the town. At present the rule in America seems to be almost universal of having only a single fare for any distance. This single fare is five cents, the universal nickel which corresponds to the English penny, although it is nominally worth two-and-a-half times as much. You can travel from the centre of any city to its circumference without having to pay more than five cents, and you pay the same amount if you go a single block. The people who go a block pay for those who go to the outskirts of the town. The necessity of street-car locomotion caused by the concentration of population in the business districts, and its scattering over wide areas outside that district, The Scat of War. 99 makes a railway franchise as valuable as a gold mine. Chicago is served by three street railways, which last year paid respectively nine, eleven, and twenty-four per cent, on stock which is said to have been largely watered. The revenue of the street railways was larger than the total amount which the City of Chicago is allow^ed to levy by its charter in taxation upon the real and personal property of the citizens. The cars are worked by cable and by horse, but there is a great prejudice against the introduction of the electric trolley into the heart of the city. The cable is a great improvement upon the horse-car, but none of the cars are constructed like our omnibuses — why, it is difficult to say. On the west and north the double-decked system would be impossible owing to the fact that 'the cars have to pass the river in tunnels, and these do not leave room enouoh for the double- o decked arrangements. But on the south side, which is the most profitable of the roads, the cable could take a double load just as easily as a single. The overcrowding of the cars, as it is, is simply frightful. At the rush hours, as they are called, in the morning, middle day, and evening, the cars are packed about as full of people as the beehive in swarming time. The seats are all occupied, the platforms at either end are crowded, and the gangways down the centre of the cars are packed as full as it is possible to pack them by persons holding on by straps. Overcrowding there would be in any case, but the extent to which over- crowding is carried on in Chicago is due to the rapacity of the street railway companies, who cynically reply to all complaints that it is the people who hang on by the straps who make their swollen dividends. No one is more ruthless than a railway corporation which has bought the right to ill-use and oppress the public H 2 lOO Chicago To-Day. by the simple process of corrupting the elected repre- sentatives of the people in the City Council asseml)led. In an American city a street railway is worth more than a gold mine, and the way in which this valuable municipal asset is flung away by the trustees of the people is one of the grossest scandals of American life. The track is vilely laid, and one of the commonest sights in Chicago is a loaded cart upset in the street, one or both of the wheels having Ijeen wrenched off by the attempt to get off the track on to the roadway. The cars are often abominably overcrowded. In the main streets the endless cable supplies motive power ; the cross streets are served by horse-cars, while in the out- skirts the admirable electric trolley ministers to the convenience of the citizens. The fare is uniform, 2^f/. any distance, long or short. Many of the private palaces in Chicago are marvels of luxury. Mr. Potter Palmer's residence on Lake Shore Drive is a magnificent reproduction in the New World of the best that the Old World can offer in architecture and in art. It is a palace worthy to Ije the seat of the uncrowned queen of the American Eepublic, Of the newspaper offices, the Herald is the newest, the most magnificent, and the best equip- ped. The hotels are brilliantly illuminated with the electric light, but I was only four months in America, and it takes longer than four months for an English- man to become acclimatised so far as to feel at home under the autocratic despotism of the American hotel clerk. Chicago supplies its own water from the lake into which, at present, it empties its sewage, diminishing the evil consequences of this by drawing its water from an intake four miles distant from the shore. It is endeavouring to deal with the street sewage The Seat of War. loi question by diverting the course of tlie Chicago River so as to pour all its sewage into the Mississippi valley, and ultimately into the Gulf of Mexico. This gigantic piece of engineering is in full progress, and will take several years before it is completed. In the matter of electric lighting, Chicago takes the lead of all the places I have ever visited. They are more lavish in their use of electricity as an illuminant than either New York, Paris, or London. The main streets are also lighted by electricity controlled by the muni- cipality, which has obtained from the legislature the right to manufacture electricity for its owai use ; but so jealous are the joint stock companies, or corpora- tions as they are called in America, of the munici- pality, that the City Council, although it has plant large enough to supply private consumers, is for- bidden to do so. That is to say, it may light the streets and it may also illuminate buildings belonging to the city, but although the plant is standing idle half the time, and it could immediately cut the price of electricity, it is forljidden to do so, not merely out of reo;ard for the vested interests of the existing cor- porations, but in order to safeguard the speculators who have hitherto been able to exploit the com- munity by supplying the community with electricity. In England we spare the vested interests, but with us the vested interests must be in existence. It is only in America where a municipality is crippled by a regard for vested interests which have not yet come into being. Chicago does not yet own its own gas, and is plundered accordingly by the Gas Trust, which deals with its customers in a high-handed fashion, which, if human curses could be as effective as witches' male- dictions, would have sent the directors of the gas 102 Chicago To- Day. companies into irremediable perdition. The other corporations from whicli Chicago suffers most are the steam railways, whose iron tracks cross the city in every direction at level grade. There are three thousand miles of steam railroads within the city limits, and there are not three thousand miles of streets. These railroads have bought their way into the city by briliing the aldermen, and are still en- gaged in the work of o1:)taining the city territory for their own purposes. Chicago is horribly paved. Most of the side walks are constructed of wood, and the majority of the streets are not paved at all. The arrangements for cleaning the streets wdiich are paved is primitive in the extreme. The idea of sweeping the streets from end to end every day has not yet dawned upon the imagination of the wildest municipal reformer in Chicago. Even last w^inter, when an army of three thousand unemployed were set to work on cleaning the streets, and some streets were cleaned which had never been before since Chicago came into existence, there were wdiole stretches of streets where the snow and mud lay for wrecks and weeks untouched. The street railways, of course, had to clear their tracks, which they did l)y the simple process of hitching a snow plough and a brushing machine upon the cable and transferring the snow from the centre of the streets to the side of the tracks, where it remained piled up in small mountains, to the infinite disgust of the inhabitants on either side. Accordino; to the city ordinances the street railways are required to remove the snow from the streets, but as they calcu- lated that it would cost about a hundred thousand dollars to do the work, they came to the conclusion that it was better to leave it undone, with the result The Seat of War. 103 that the long-suffering people rose in revolt in several streets and piled the snow across the tracks, effectu- ally blocking the traffic. This led sometimes almost to riots, which required the intervention of the police to put a stop to. The boulevards and avenues were an exception to the rest of the streets ; they are asphalted, and form an admirable causeway for cyclists and for driving. They are planted with trees, and constitute a most attractive feature of the city. The universal use of soft coal blackened the buildinos almost as much as in London. The difference between Chicago and some of the eastern cities which burn nothing but anthracite is very marked. The fire department of Chicago is probably the best in the world. The lesson of the o-reat fire taught the citizens that they must at any rate rescue that branch of the city service from the devastating blight of the spoils system. The organisation of the department is almost perfect. The discipline and esprit de corps of the firemen are beyond praise, and the annals of human heroism contain few finer or more terrible stories than those in which the fire-king's of Chica2;o sacrificed their lives. They have four firemen per 10,000 inhabitants, more than double the London pro- portion. Each citizen in London pays 6d. per head to the Fire Brigade, and his share of the annual loss by fire is 5s. ; but the Chicago poll-tax is no less than 45., and the annual loss per head by fire is over 14.s\ Such, at least, are the figures given by Mr. Pickard, of Chicago, in a recent number of the American Journal of Politics. Another admirable institution of the City of Chicago which might be adopted with advantage in our English Babylon is that of the police patrol waggon. I04 C/iicago To- Day. At almost every block, certainly on every l)eat, the constable on patrol has a call-box by which he can telephone to the nearest police-station for assist- ance. Whether it is an incipient riot that is to be quelled, a drunken man to be conveyed to the station, or the victims of some accident to be carried to the hospital, there is no need for him to leave his l)eat, A single word through the telephone, and in a minute or two the clano-ino; bell of the wasfSfon is heard as it dashes down the streets as hard as two galloping horses can take it. Three or four police- men are in the waggon, a small mobile force con- stantly held in readiness to be hurled at the gallop in any direction at a moment's notice. Before the crowd has had time to realise what is the matter, the patrol waggon is on the spot, the ringleaders are under arrest, and the waggon — with the captives — is rattling l;)ack to the police-station, leaving the patrol man free to resume his usual round. The police force of Chicago consists of 2,726 men to 1,600,000; that of London, of 13,314 men to five millions population. All the policemen in Chicago carry stout clubs and loaded revolvers, with which, on occasion, they do not hesitate to shoot. The policemen are, on the whole, a fine body of men — Irishmen, for the most part ; they have heavy work to do, and they do it very well under difficulties almost inconceivable by the London constable. They have immense power, and they use it after the usual fashion of policemen, to levy blackmail. The whole force is poisoned by politics, and its morale is greatly injured by the impossibility of obtaining justice against anyone who has a political pull. Justice, in the English acceptation of the word, is simply un- realised even in dreams in Chicago police courts. The Scat of War. 105 which, however, are no worse, if, indeed, they are not better, than the Justi(^e Shops which correspond to our County Courts. The municipal ordinanc-es of the City of Chicago are excellent. The only troul^le is that they are not enforced. The law is explicit in forbidding saloons to keep open after midnight. But any saloon-keeper who stands in with the police never shuts his doors all night long. The law is severe against opium joints. But the pig-tailed heathen plies his trade under cover of police protection, for which, of course, due ])lackmail must Ije paid.* But the most flagrant scandal of all is the case of the o-ambling; hells. Gaming houses run wide open night and day in Chicago, althousfh the law of the State of Illinois and the municipal ordinances of the City of Chicago expressly forbid gambling. There are said to be from 1,500 to 2,000 gamblers, regular professionals, who live and thrive in Chicago upon the profits of the o-amino- hells. One of these establishments which I visited had four faro, four roulette, five poker, and two hazard g-ames runnino;. Its wao;e bill is said t;) amount to £36,000 per annum.* * As this is a kind of curiosity in its way, I extract the figures as giv, n in tl;e Interocean. The Weekly Pay Koll of Vaunell's Gaming House at 119, Clark St.jket Twenty-four faro dealers . at $40 $960 Twelve roulette croupiers 35 420 Six hazard men ... 35 210 Nine card dealers 35 315 Three floor walkers 50 150 Three managers... 75 225 Three doorkeepers 30 90 T wo barkeepers 20 40 Six porters 8 48 Eight outside niiMi 30 240 Forty cappers, bottler.--, and bounce: s .. 15 600 $: !,29S per week, or $17 1,496 per annum io6 Chicago To- Day. This is only one of scores of establishments running wide open in Chicago, under the eyes of the police, every man of whom is sworn to enforce the law by seizing all the instruments of gaming, and arrest gaml)lers wherever he can find them. Nothino; can be 2;reater than the contrast between • . . . . -r the awe in which the politician in London regards the Nonconformist conscience and the absolute in- difference with which the Chicago politician regards the Christian sentiment of the community. So far as politics — city politics — go, you might imagine that there were no churches in Chicago, and that Mr. Moody had no existence. The churches and Mr. Moody may have saved the souls of many excellent citizens, but they have most egregiously failed in saving the city administration from going headlong to the devil. The saloon keepers and the gamblers run the city. Of the sixty-eight aldermen who occupy seats in the City Hall, not more than eighteen can, by any stretch of charity, be described as honest men. Several of them are saloon keepers ; some are either gaming-house keepers, or are hand in glove with gaming-house keepers. Fifty of them are admittedly in the market ready to sell their votes and trade away the property of the city to the highest bid- der. All this is notorious and undisputed. Yet the Boss of the Boodlers, the head of the ring of corrupt aldermen, was elected l)y a majority of two to one in his ward last month, although twelve brother boodlers dis- appeared from the council at the same time. All the arguments of all the reformers do not weigh a cent against the alderman's distribution of Christmas turkeys, and the persuasive arguments of hard cash. Bribery at elections is general, treating universal. The whole municipal administration is run on the The Seat of War. 107 spoils system, and wlien I was in Chicago every nurse in the lunatic asylum was sent packing in order to make room for the nominees of the new Republican Commissioners who had succeeded in the Democratic majority. It is this which is the pestilent, poisonous gan- grene of Chicago. Compared with that festering corruption which eats into the whole of the city administration, the houses of ill-fame are compara- tively respectable institutions. Yet, although there are a few efforts made to reclaim the poor Magdalens of the Levee, not a single missionary effort has l)een put forth to rescue the boodlers of the City Hall. What is still more strange, as yet not even the most languid attempt has been made to turn the rascals out. " What is the use ? " says cynical Chicago. " If we get rid of this crowd, we should get a worse crew in their place." Chicago has at present the good fortune to have a capable, resolute, honest, young Mayor, who is heroic- ally fighting against immense odds the Imttle of municipal honesty and, of course, reform. But as he is a Democrat the Republicans stand aloof, and as he is a Catholic the Protestants of the A. P. A. persuasion hold him in holy horror. For both religious bigotry and partisan rancour are far more rampant in Chicago than in London. There is a curious renaissance of Titus Gates and of Lord George Gordon visible all over the North- West. Chicago is not a religious city as a whole, and what religion there is seems to be largely Catholic. There are double as many attend- ants at Catholic churches as there are in the Protestant places of worship. Almost all the offices are held by Catholics. This is, for the most part, not because they are Catholics so much as because I oS Chicago To -Day. tliey are Irisli. The Irish, being forbidden to rule their own country, have recoujDed themselves l^y ruling the great American cities. Mr. Pocock, writing in last month's Forum, points out that the Irisli, although in a minority everywhere, have for years past held almost a monopioly of municijDal offices in the followino' cities : — ■ New York Boston Troy Kansas City Brooklyn Chicago Pittsburg Omaha Jersey City Buffalo St. Paul" New Orleans Hoboken Albany St. Louis San Francisco In Chicago, the Irishman is everywhere to the front, and the Catholic Archbishop Feehan does not stretch out a finger to keep him in the straight path. The Mayor, although born in Buffalo, is a John Patrick Hopkins. The Chief of Police, Mr. Brennan, is a member of the Clan-na-Gael, who was born in Ireland. The City Treasurer was born in Ireland. The Chief of Detectives is Jno. U. Shea, an Irish- American, and so forth, and so forth. One-half of the aldermen and two-thirds of the policemen are Irish. They run the city, and are far more import- ant in their own eyes and other people's than they are anywhere else in the world. So convinced are some of them as to the supreme position of their race, that I had some difficulty in persuading an Irish housemaid that the Pope was not an Irishman. Pier disgust at learning that he was only a Dago — Chicao;oan for Italian — was as suo'o-estive as it was amusing. Chicaoo is interestino; to Enolishmen because it is the only city which has taken a 2:)art both directly and indirectly in English affairs. It was in Chicago that the Clan-na-Grael organised the dynamite cam- paign, and it was from Chicago that they despatched The Scat of War. 109 some twenty emissaries charged with instructions to destroy the public luiildings and the puljlic men of England in the cause of Irish nationality. The C*lan- na-Gael is still a power in Chicago. The mayor is reputed to 1)e a memlier of its organisation, and the chief of police undoul)tedly is one of the clan ; but the feuds wdiich divide the Irish in Chicago, and wliich came to a head in the murder of Mr. Cronin, still exist. Mr. Gladstone's name is one to conjure with amono" the Irish of Chicao;o, and the more rea- sonable were disposed to accept the Home Eule Bill as a joledge of the reunion between the nations. But the indirect influence of Chicago upon us is even greater. Chicago, as the head and centre of the great central states, has done more to force the Irish question to the front by its cheap beef than by all its dynamite. It was the slaughter-houses of the stock-yards which cut to the root of Irish landlordism, and for the matter of that of English landlordism also. Not until the next century has dawned shall we be able to realise adequately the extent to which Chicago and the Chicago exporters of Ijeef, pork, and wheat have undermined the ancient social organism of the United Kingdom. When I was a Iwy New England was the centre of interest to Old England. The group of poets, essay- ists, and philosophers which lived at Boston were the best know^n of all Americans. One by one these great ones have died, and now Oliver Wendell Holmes almost alone remains. Later Henry Ward Beecher and Goff represented another section of American life which influenced directly and indirectly the social, religious, and intellectual life of the Old World. But they have gone, and now there are only two Ameri- cans who are sufficiently well known l)y the masses of no Chicago To- Day. the English people to be able to fill the largest hall in any city in which they choose to speak. Both of these are from Chicago. One is Mr. Moody, and the other is Miss Willard. The future of Chicago is an additional reason for regarding with intense interest the course of affairs on the shore of Lake Michigan. Professor Badcock, a scholar and an historian, who has devoted many years to the problem of the probable centre of the American continent, has written a treatise in which he claims to demonstrate that, from every consideration — historical, ethnographical, ethnological, and j3olitical — the future centre of the American Republic must in time come to be found near the southern end of Lake Michie^an. Without following the Professor through his elaborate calculations, it is obvious that a city which stands mid- way between the great lakes system of the north and the immense waterway of the Mississippi and Missouri, which, despite all the disasters which have befallen it, and the jealousy and opposition of rivals, has forced its way to the first place but one in the American continent, and which has as its only rival a city situated on the rim of the continent, is not likely to fall behind in the race for the possession of the capital of the New World. Unlike New York, which has only an island to live upon, and which cannot spread beyond a certain circumscribed area, Chicago threatens in time to cover the whole of the state of Illinois. It has space enough on the shores of Lake Michigan for the population of ten millions wdiich is predicted for it in the course of the next fifty years, when the transoceanic canal is constructed, wdiich will enable the steamers of all countries to discharge their cargoes at the wharves of Chicago. Even now, if New York is the mistress of the Eastern States, Chicao^o is not The Seat of War. 1 1 1 less easily queen of the Central and Western States. From Chicago emanate influences which are felt in every farmstead from the lakes to the Gulf. Chicago is singularly deficient from the English standpoint in many necessary institutions. It is almost incredible that such a city, so great and pros- perous, should be so miserably devoid of the appliances of civilisation as we understand them in the older world. In the whole city there is scarcely a place where you can wash your face excepting in a public- house. The first public bath was opened shortly before Christmas. No one is permitted to bathe in the lake, there are no coffee palaces, teetotums, or anything of that kind in the whole of the city. There is a public library with four branch reading-rooms and many places of call throughout the city, but of insti- tutions such as the People's Palace and the Poly- technic and the old Mechanics' Institutes, there are practically none. For the common man in Chicago, either in recreation or refreshment, or almost anything, the saloon is almost the only institution which cares for his material wants. The churches may save his soul, but they take very little account of his body ; while they damn the saloon keeper vigorously enough in theory, they allow the saloon keeper to run the machine pretty much as he pleases, nor do they demean themselves so far as to enter into competition with him on his own ground. The necessity of fighting the saloon by putting something better in its place is beginning to be recognised, however, and one of the most gratifying signs of the times was the launching of the scheme of the People's Institute in connection with the popular Ijut temporary institute which is carried on on the AVest Side by Bishop Fallows and the Rev. Dr. Clark. 1 1 2 Chicago To-Day. If such an institute were estaljlislied in every one of the thirty-four wards of the city, Chicago woukl have done something practical towards meeting the great social needs of the labouring population upon wdiose industry depends so much of her greatness. Hull House, which may be regarded as a superior and more social Toynbee Hall, has been and is one of the chief hopes of the future of Chicago. The best hope for Chicago is in the multiplication of Hull Houses or branch establishments affiliated with the central insti- tution in all the slum districts of the city. It would l)e difficult to imao'ine a o;reater contrast between the worthless society woman who devotes her days to pleasure and her nights to more or less pleasuraljle dissipation, and the patient laborious Christlike work of Miss Addams and her coadjutors in Hull House. Beginning with small things, they have gradually ex- panded and developed their beneficent activities until they have made Hull House the social centre of the whole district. Whether they be Bohemians, or Poles, or Jews, or Italians, the friendless populations in the vicinity find a ready welcome and a sym- patliising hearing from the inmates of Hull House. The place simply swarms with clubs of all kinds. The gymnasium is an admirable institution for the training of both sexes. A New England Kitchen teaches by example the value of scientific cooking, and there is a well furnished library and artistic picture gallery, and a charming creclie ministers to the needs of the people in every direction, while dispen- saries, savings banks, and co operative institutions fiourish amain. The place is a stronghold of women, especially among women, and there is no place in Chicago where all that makes for progress has such ready and energetic lielp as from Hull House. 113 Chapter II. — The Millionaire and IIls Model Town. Mr. George M. Pullman, whose refusal to consent to arbitration was the cause of the recent industrial war, is the man who has made the Pullman car a household word in every land for its convenience, its comfort, and its luxury. Unlike Mr. Field, who is said to be a leap-year politician, voting only once in four years when a President is to be elected, Mr. George M. Pullman is an active Ptepublican, well known in Washington, and much esteemed by party treasurers, to whose campaign funds he has been a liberal contributor. Mr. George M. Pullman, in ad- dition to many acts of private charity, is notable anion o; the millionaires of Chicao;o as the man who, taking a hint from Krupp, endeavoured to found a town in his own image. The town of Pullman, which was named after the author of its being, is a remarkable experiment, which has achieved a very great success. CJnlike Mr. Field or Mr. Armour, Mr. Pullman has built up his fortune without resorting to the more ruthless methods of modern competition. Indeed, his career is notable as an instance of competition by high prices rather than by low. Mr. Field wiped out the retail storemen, and Mr. Armour the small butchers, by underselling them. Mr. Pullman has undersold no one. He has always succeeded, not by producing a cheaper article, but by producing a dearer ; but the higher-priced article was so much better that Mr. Pullman succeeded in establishing a virtual 114 Chicago To- Day. monopoly of one of the most liiglily-specialised busi- nesses in the workl. This is the more remarkable l)ecause Mr. Pullman was not originally a mechanic. He was merely a man of reflective mind, of native ingenuity, and of great persistence. The inconvenience of a journey on the cars before the Pullmans were invented turned his attention to the possibility of making the sleeper as comfortable in the cars as in a hotel. The moment he set to work to realise his idea he was confronted with the fact that it could not be done "on the cheap." Nothing daunted, he decided it should be done at a high price if it could not be done at low. The first Pullman car which he con- structed and put on the rails cost 18,000 dollars to build, as against 4,000 dollars, which was the price of the ordinary sleeper. Railway men shrugged their shoulders. It was magnificent, they said, but it was not business. A palace sleeping car, at 18,000 dollars could not possibly pay. Mr. Pullman refused to be discouraged. " Let the travelling public decide," was all he asked ; " run your old sleepers and the new one together ; I will charge half a dollar more for a Ijertli in the Pullman and see v/hich holds the field." The verdict of the public was instant and decisive ; every one preferred the Pullman at the extra price, and the success of the inventive car-builder was assured. He has gone on step by step, from car to car, until at the present moment he is said to have a fieet, as he calls it, of nearly 2,000 sleepers, which are operated by the Pullman Company. They have besides 58 dining cars and G50 bufiet cars. Altogether the cars which the company operates number 2,573. Other competitors have come into the field, but Mr. Pullman deserves the distinction !of having placed ^^ GEORGE M. PULLMAN. 1 2 1 1 6 Chicago To-Day . every railway traveller under an obligation by acting as pioneer of commodious, luxurious, and safe railway travelling. After building liis cars in various parts, Mr. Pullman decided finally to centralise in the centre of the American continent. Carrying out his decision, he naturally fixed upon Chicago as the site for his works. The Pullman Company was incorporated with a capital of 30,000,000 dollars, the quotation for which in the market to-day is twice that amount. From the first year of its existence, says the writer of " The Story of Pullman," proudly, it has paid its quarterly dividends with the regularity of a govern- ment loan, and its $30,000,000 of capital has a market value of $60,000,000, while its stock is so largely sought as a rock-ril:)bed security for the invest- ment of the funds of educational and charitable institutions, of women and of trust estates, that out of its 3,246 stockholders, 1,800 are of this class, and 1,494 of these 1,800 are women. He took up an estate of over three thousand acres round Lake Calumet, which is fourteen miles from the centre of Chicaoo, and which was at that time far outside the city limits. There, following the example of Messrs. Krupp at Essen, he set to work to construct a model city in his own image. The car-works were, of course, the centre and nucleus of all. In these gigantic fac- tories, where 14,000 employees w^ork up 50,000,000 feet of lumber every year, and 85,000 tons of iron, they have a productive capacity of 100 miles of cars per annum. Their annual output, when they are working at full stretch, is 12,500 freight cars, 313 sleeping cars, 626 passenger cars, and 939 street cars.* * The statistical data were given by the Pullman Company in " The Story of Pullman." Total amount of lumber used anoimlly by the Pullman C( mpany, about 51,000,000 feet. 1 1 8 Chicago To- Day. Mr. Pullman's ambition was to make tlie city wliich lie had built an ideal community. In order to do so lie proceeded in entire accordance with the dominant feeling of most wealthy Americans by ignoring absolutely the fundamental principle of American institutions. The Autocrat of all the Eussias could not more absolutely disbelieve in government by the people, for the people, through the people, than George Pullman. The whole city belongs to him in fee simple ; its very streets were the property of the Pullman Company. Like Tam- many Hall and various other effective institutions in America, not from the broad basis of the popular will, but from tli-e apex of the presiding boss. Mr. Pullman was his own boss. He laid out the city, and made the Pullman Company the terrestrial Total quantity of iron used annually, about 85,000 tons. Total number of employees (July 31st, 1893), 14,G35. Total amount of wages earned daily by Pullman employees, $24,965.63. There are operated by the Pullman Company 2,573 sleeping, parlour, and dining cars. Of these 650 are buffet cars and 58 are dining cars. During the year ending July 31st, 1893, the number of miles run by Pullman cars was 206,453,796, and there were carried 5,673,129 passengers. About 9,000 meals are served daily in Pullman dining and buffet cars. Tliere are about 33,000,0C0 pieces of Pullman car linen laundried annually. Mileage of railroads under contract, 126,975. The longest regular, unbroken run of any cars in the Pullman service is from Boston to Los Angeles, 4,322 miles. The total producing capacity of construction shops per annum is 12,520 freight cars, 813 sleeping cars, 626 passenger cars and 939 street cais. Coupled together these cars would make a train over 100 miles in length. If all the lumber used annually in Pullman shops alone were delivered on one train, the train would consist of 5,000 cars and would be thirty-live miles long. 'J'lic Pullman savings bank has 2,000 depositors, and their deposits amount to |,632,000, an average per person of $316. The average wages per day for workmen of all classes in Pullman shops, including boys and women, is $2.26. The Town of Pullman has eight miles of paved streets, and 12,000 inhabitants, of whom 6,324 are operatives. Of the 2,246 Pullman employees who live on the borders of the town, about 1,000 own their own homes. All the sewage of tlie Town of Pullman is collected in a 300,000 gallon reservoir imder the water tower, and pumped to the Pullman produce farm three miles away. The Millionaire and His Model Tozvn. 119 providence of all its inhabitants. Out of a dreary, water-soaked prairie, Mr. Pullman reared high and dry foundations, upon which, with the aid of his architect and landscape engineer, he planned one of the model towns of the American continent. Here was a captain of industry acting as the city builder. Here is the Pullman Company's own account of the Town of Pullman : — Jlr. Pullman fixed upon tlic vicinity of Lake Caliiinet, f.uirtceu milrs away, in the heart of the i-ity, as the site fur his works. Here he purchased 8,5U() acres, which has since iiicrea-ed in v.due proportionately with Oliica.j^-u'.s rrmnrkable development. Tlie entire tract is no.v embraced within the boundary Tunits of the gieat city. Even now, the Pullman district is a cenlrc, itronnd which tliere is a coanjcte 1 girdle of thickly populnted cimniunitics. At a very early date tlio boautiiul tuwn of PuUni in, witli ils shaded avenues, its glimpses of bright water, its harmonious groupings of tasteful hoiui'S and ciiurches and public buildings, the wiiole cnlwin-ed here and there wi.h the green of lawns and the bloom uf clustured b mlcs of Howers — at a very c.irly date all this will be as a briglit and radiant little island in the midst I'f the great tumultuous sea of Chic igo's population ; a restful oasis in the wearying br!ck-and-m.)rtar waste of an enormous e'.ty. And then, too, at its very door wdl come, not long hence, the bulk of Chicago's manufacturing commerce. It is only a matter of a .-hort time wliea Lake Calumet, along which tlie ruUmanland stretches for miles, wid becom;; an inside harbour. The thirty million bricks per year which the Pullma i Comfjany is now manu<'acLuriug are made of clay taken from the bottom of tiie lake, and in the meantime tlie Government is dredging out the river which connects Calumet with the thousands of miles of waterway of the great chain of 1 dves which lead to tlie ocean and to the world beyond seas. What this land, which a dozen years ago was bleak, sodden prairie, will represent wlien this comes to pass, and great ships are moored to its miles oi' water front, is an interesting item in speculations upon the marvellous ])robab:lities of Chicago's future growtli. Tlie day is not only coming, but is near at hand, when the |3i»,000,<)00 present capital stock of the Pullman Company will be covered, and more tlian covered, by the value of the 3,5iJ0 acres of land on wliich is built the town of Pullman. Of the details of how Pullman was constructed; of how the dreary, water- soaked prairie was raised to high and dry land ; of how the entire town was planned and blocked out in all its symmetrical unity of purpose by l\lr. Pullman himself; of how the architect and landscape engineer, working together, cari-ied out the details of the plan to their harmonious and beautiful conclusion — all this has been told and retold in the scores of studies of Pullman whicli have appeared in print on both sides of the Atlantic. In the same publications tliere have appeared minute descriptions of the system by which the sewage of the town is collected and pumped far away to the Pullman produce farm; of how every house and flat, even to the cheapest in rent, is equipped with the modern appliances of water, gas, and internal sanitation ; of how grounds for athletic sports were made ; all the merchandising of the town concentrated imder the glass roof of a beautiful 120 Chicago To- Day. fircadc building; a market house erected that is the ornament of one oT tbe handsomest squares in the town ; churches built ; a beautiful school-house ])ut up, in which there attend nearly a thousand scholars; a library founded of over 8,000 volumes ; a savings bank established, paying a liberal rate of interest and conforming in its regulations to the greatest convenience of the wage-earners ; a theatre provided that is an artistic gem. All this has been detailed so much at length tliat there need be to it only a passing reference. With these details in mind, imagine a perfectly equipped town of 12,000 inhabitants, built out from one central thought to a beautiful and harmonious whole. A town that is bordered with bright beds of flowers and green velvety stretches of lawn ; that is shaded with trees and dotted with parks and pretty water vistas, and glimpses here and there of artistic sweeps of landscape gardening ; a town where the homes, even to the most modest, are bright and wholesome and filled with pure air and light; a town, in a word, where all that is ugly, and discordant, and demoralising is eliminated, and all that inspires to self-respect, to thrift, and to cleanliness of person and of thought is generously provided. Imagine all this, and try to picture the empty, sodden morass out of which this beautiful vision was reared, and yon will tlien have some idea of the splendid work, in its physical aspects at least, which the far-reaching plan of Mr. Pullman has wrought. It was not a philanthropic, but a business experi- ment, and none the worse on that account. The great principle of quid pro quo was carried out with undeviating regularity. If every resident of Pull- man had gas laid to his house, he was compelled to pay for it at the rate of 2 dollars 25 cents a thousand feet, although the cost of its manufacture to the Pullman Company was only 33 cents a thousand feet. Ample water supply was given, with good pressure, but of this necessary of life the Pullman Company w^as able to extract a handsome profit. The city of Chicago supplied the corporation with water at 4 cents a thousand gallons, which was re- tailed to the Pullmanites at 10 cents per thousand, making a profit large enough to enable the corpora- tion to have all the water it wanted for its works for nothinor. Thus did the business instinct of Mr. Pullman enable his right hand to wash his left, and thereby created at the very threshold of Chicago are object lessons as to the commercial profits of muni- cipal socialism. But between municipal socialism, representing the co-operative effort of a whole coiU' ARCADE TUEATEE, PULLMAN 122 Chicago To- Day. munity voluntarily combining for tlie purpose of making the most of all monopolies of service, and the autocratic exploiting of a whole population of a city, such as is to be found in Pullman, there is a wide gulf fixed. As a resident in the model town wrote me, Pullman was all very well as an employer, but to live and breathe and have one's beino; in Pullman was a little bit too much. The residents in the city, he continued, "paid rent to the Pullman Company, they bought gas of the Pullman Company, they walked on streets owned in fee simple by the Pullman Company, they paid water-tax to the Pullman Company. Indeed, even when they bought gingham for their wives or sugar for their tables at the arcade or the market-house, it seemed dealing with the Pullman Company. They sent their children to Pullman's school, attended Pullman's church, looked at but dared not enter Pullman's hotel with its private bar, for that was the limit. Pullman did not sell them their grog. They had to o'o to the settlement at the railroad crossino- south of them, to Kensington, called, because of its long row of saloons, ' bumtown,' and given over to disorder. There the moral and spiritual disorder of Pullman was emptied, even as the physical sewage fiowed out on the Pullman farm a few miles further south, for the Pullman Company also owned the sewerage system, and turned the waste into a fluid, forced through pipes and conducted underground to enrich the soil of a large farm. The lives of the working men were bounded on all sides by the Pullman Company ; Pullman was the horizon in every direction." All this provoked reaction, and a feeling of resent- ment sprang up m the model city against the too 124 Chicago To- Day. paternal despotism of tlie city builder, and so it came to pass that the citizens by a vote annexed them- selves to Chicago, of which it is now part and parcel. This was a sore blow and a great discouragement to Mr. Pullman. But no annexation can destroy his control over the town. It is still the property of the corporation of which he is the controlling mind. How little he foresaw the dispute which has con- vulsed the industry of the United States may be gathered from the following complacent reflections with which the Pullman Company conclude their "Story of Pullman":— On the business theory that the better the man, the more valuable he is to liimself, just in that proportion is he better and more valuable to his employer ; on this simple business theory an attempt has been made to surround the working men in Pullman with such influences as would most fend to bring out the highest and best there was in them. So far from start- ing with the theory that these working men are weaklings to whom things are to be given, and who must be held up and supported lest they fall, the starting point is in exactly the opposite direction. The assumption is that the Pullman men are the best type of American workmen, who stand solidly and firmly on their own feet, and will work out valuable and well-rounded lives just in proportion to their opportunities. By the investment of a large capital, it is found possible not only to give them better conditions than tiicy could get elsewhere, but to give those conditions at prices wholly within their power to pay ; and yet sufficient to return a moderate interest on the invest- ment, and so sustain it and make it enduring. That is the whole Pullman proposition in a nutshell. With philanthropy of the abstract sentimental sort it has nothing to do. With the philanthropy which helps men to help themselves, without either undermining their self-respect, or in the remotest degree touching their independence or absolute personal liberty — with philanthropy of this type it has everything to do. To measure the actual effect of the conditions which exist at Pullman, it is only necessary to look at any representative assemblage of the Pullman workmen. During the eleven years that the town has been in existence, the Pullman working man has developed into a distinct type — distinct in appear- ance, in tidiness of dress, in fact in all the external indications of self-respect. Not only as compared with the majority of men in similar walks of life do they show in their clearer complexions and brighter eyes the sanitary effects of the cleanliness and the abundance of pure air and sunlight in which they live, but there is in their bearing and personal demeanour what seems to be a distinct reflection of the general atmosphere of order and artistic taste which permeates the entire town. It is within the mark to say that a representative gathering of Pullman workmen would be quite forty per cent, better in evidences of thrift and refinement, and in all the outward indications of a wholesome habit of life, than would a reiwesentative gathering of any cor- rcspojidiilg group of working men which could be assembled elsewhere in the The Millionaire and His Model Totvn. 125 country. Nor do the benefits that liave been bi-ouo;bt about stop at mere external indications. Tlie Pullman workman has a distinct rank of his own, which is recognised by employers everywhere in tlie United States, and which makes him universally in demand and sought after. Tliere is, as a matter of fact, hardly a great producing centre in the country, in the fields reached by the great Pullman industries, to which Pullman men have not been brought by special inducements of promotion or wages. The story of tlie town of Pullman is but a repetition on a largo scale of the story of the building of the first Pullman car. Tlie same organic solidity of structure, the same faith in the intrinsic commercial value of the beautiful, which entered into the one entered into the other. The Pullman car solved the problem of long continuous railway journeys, and the town of Pullraau along new lines, gives a hope of bettering the relations of capital and labour. The issue of this last is a question of the future, but it is at least a legitimate subject of speculation, whether what the car wrought in one direction, witli all its attendant and lasting benefits to humanity, may not in some sort, ou a broader scale, and with benefits to humanity even more far-reaching and enduring, be repeated in the great field where the town of Pullman now st:inds as the advance guard of a new departure and a new idea. In brief, the Pullman enterprise is a vast object-lesson. It has demonstrated man's capacity to improve and to appreciate improvements. It has shown that success may result from coiporale action which isalike free from default, foreclosure or wreckage of any sort. It has illustrated the helptul com- bination of capital and labour, without strife or stultification, upon lines of mutual recognition. I have quoted wliat Mr. Pullman thinks of him- self and the town which he has built. It may not l)e without interest to see what is thought of Mr. Pullman, not by trades union agitators, but by a Methodist minister who, on May 21, deemed it his duty to preach in the Methodist Church of Pullman on the text " The labourer is worthy of his hire." I cannot keep still and smother my convictions YdU need not fear that the company will retaliate upon us as a church for anything I may .-ay. It dare not in the face of public opinion. And, let me add, if the fears of some of you should ever be realised, better a thousand times that our church bu disorganised by the company than that we truckle to them, forego the God- given and American right to free speech, smother our convictions, muzzle our mouths, fawn beneath the smiles of any rich man or corporation. Better to die for the truth than be surfeited by a lie. Sutfer a word regarding Mr. Pullman himself. I have nothing to say of him that savours of fulsome eulogy or nauseating pra^'se. I will not speak of him as a philanthropist, for I have never seen nor heard of any evidence of this. I will not speak of his services to his age, because I know of none I will not refer to his services to his country, as history is silent thereon. After referring to Mr. Pullman's admitted abilit}' as a business man, raising himself from a poor boy in 1 2 6 Chicago To- Day. ci country town to his present position as head of a great manufacturing industry, Mr. Cawardine said : — In this age of rapidly increa3ing fortunes, when men become rich in a day by speculation, rearing a fabric of success upon the ruin of others, I am willing to accord him all honour ; but when Mr. Pullman as a public man stands before the world and demands of us that we regard him as a benefactor to his race, as a true philanthropist, as one who respects his fellow men, who regards his employees with the love of a father for his children, and would have us classify him with such men as George Peabady, Peter Cooper, and George W. Childs, I confess, as a minister of the gospel, delivering my message in the shadow of these deserted shops, I fail utterly to see the point. The facts are not in accordance with the assertions made. If he is all. this, then let me ask him a question or two : — Why does Mr. Pulhnan, in the midst of a hard and rigorous winter, when the hours of work were few and the wages at their lowest ebb ; when whole families were in want; when the churches burdened with their heavy rents were seeking to relieve the poor, and that noble organisation, the Woman's Union — which we were not allowed to call the "Relief" Union for fear of hurting Mr. Pullman's pride — was doing all it could to help the destitute; why was it that our cry for help whs unheeded and no large amount was given by Mr. Pullman or by the company ? Why (lid ho permit one of his officials to publish a statement that there was no destitution in Pullman, and that there could not be as long as $720,000 was deposited in the bank to the credit of the labouring men, a statement ■which I have reason to believe was, in effect, false and misleading? Why does not Mr. Pullman do something for the moral and educational development of this place ? Why does he extort such exorbitant rents from the churches of tliis community? Wliy does he not assist the Young Men's Christian Association just a little? Why does he not give us an emergency hospital, of which we stand so much in need ? And, last not least, why, let me ask, does he not as a man of tiesh and blood like ourselves, bring himself into a little closer contact witli the public life of our town, cheer his employees with his fatherly presence, and allow the calloused hand of laboi^r occasionally to grasp the gentle hand of the man who professes to be so intensely interested in our welfare ? Never until George M. Pullman can give a satisfactory answer to theje questions will I account him a benefactor to his race, a lover of his kind, a philanthropist, or one who has done anything for posterity which will cause mankind, when his dust slumbers beneath the sod, to rise up and call him blessed. The great trouble with this whole Pullman system is that it is not what it pretends to be. To a casual visitor it is a veritable paradise ; but it is a iiollow mockery, a sham, an institution girdled with red tape, and as a solution of the labour problem most unsatisfactory The great trouble with the town of Pullman, viewed from the standpoint of an industritd experiment, is that its deficiencies overbalance all its beauties. It is the most un-American town in all America. It belongs to the map of I'iUrope. It is a civilised relic of old world serfdom. To-day we behold the lamentable and logical outcome of the whole system. So far Mr. Cawardine, who besides uttering these remarks, entered upon an exhaustive disquisition on the causes of the strike. 127 Chapter III. ^Labour and its Leaders. In no country is tlie lot of a lahour leader a happy one. It is peculiarly unenviable in the United States. The universal suspicion is especially rife among the Labour LTnions. As an eminent labour leader said to me, the moment a man Ijy industry, character, or genius raises his head one inch above the dead level of mediocrity he is at once marked down, his every action is misinterpreted and every evil motive is imputed to him by those who imagine that his rise implies their fall. Nevertheless the position of leader never seems to go a-begging. The Labour Party in America at the present moment has no fewer than four distinct chiefs. To begin with Chicago, which has its Trade and Labour Assembly, its Parliament of Labour, repre- senting or attempting to represent all the unions in the city. The leading spirit in this assemljly is Mr. William C. Pomeroy, who is also general organiser for the Federation of Labour. Mr. Pomeroy is a Kentuckian, of some education and wide readino- with a natural o;enius and maonetic power wdiich stood in small need of book training. He is in many respects the most remarkable person- ality in the camp of labour in Chicago. His address of w^elcome to the Federation of Labour was unique. His position — idolised by some, detested by others, and distrusted by most — is exceptional. It might be made commanding. All that he needs to attain to any position for good to which he might care to WILLIAM C. POMEKOY (General Organiser oj the American Federation of Labour). Labour and its Leaders. 129 aspire is the command of the confidence of his fellows. On the day when Mr, Pomeroy is trusted in America as John Burns, for example, is trusted in England, the labour men will not need to look further for their leader. Mr. Pomeroy is much the most eloc[uent of the representatives of labour to whom I had the plea- sure of listening during my stay in America. His oratory is, perhaps, too rhetorical for English ideas ; but he is a son of the South, and he has all the exuberance of rhetoric which seems to l)elong to the southern races. He has some taste in letters, and he was passing through the press when I left Chicago a somewhat notable novel entitled " The Lords of Misrule," which is not merely a scathing indictment of the capitalist system, but a prophecy of the evolution of the social and political forces in the United States. Mr. Pomeroy is a man who has thought much, his reliections are original, and liis conclusions such as naturally attract attention. He is no Socialist, but a strong trades-unionist of the old school. In his novel he sketches the evolutio]i of a socialist state of society which has as its natural and inevitable result the paralysis of all human exertion, the mainspring of improvement being cut by the dead level enforced by the socialist state. He does not regard socialism as the ultimate outcome and solution of the prol)lems of society. His views are somewhat pessimist. He thinks that the socialist state would gravitate into militarism, and out of militarism would come the division of the American continent into two or three rival states. Whatever we may think of Mr. Pomeroy as a seer of events still in the womb of the future, there is no doubt but that he has reasoned out his conclusions with a orreat deal of 130 C J lie ago To- Day. thought, and he has presented them in a form which can hardly fail to command considerable attention, not merely among the readers of " Looking Back- wards," but also among the more select circle of political students and sociologists. Mr. Pomeroy openly declares that he is a disciple of Tom Paine, and in the last speech which I heard him deliver he roundly declared that the gospel according to Tom Paine was the only gospel which was believed in by the American working men. Notwithstanding this, he introduced into his speech a very fervent de- claration of his devotion to Christ, " whose church was the w^orld, whose pulpit was the breasts of men, and whose religion was humanity." " No wonder," he de- clared, " that the sons and daughters of toil cheer His name. Nor can you," said he, " separate Christ from His Church ; " but his conception of the church differs widely from that of orthodox Christendoui. Christ's church, according to Mr. Pomeroy, is "within the inner temple of ihe pulsating hearts of the peoples of the WT^rld, and in listening to His sermons they forget those of the salaried soothsayer." Notwithstanding this denunciation of the " salaried soothsayer," Mr. Pomeroy concluded his speech by an impassioned appeal to the churches to produce a new Peter the Hermit who would preach a new crusade for the redemption not of the Holy Sepulchre but of the desecrated temple of humanity. " Peter," said Mr. Pomeroy, " must come from the churches. We want their help, and they will not follow Peter of our raising." A notable declaration, and true withal. Mr. Pomeroy was one of the chief founders of the Modern Church, a curious institution which is not unlike our Labour Church, but which only meets every other Sunday. Its gatherings alternate with the Labo^t}^ and its Leaders. 131 fortnightly meetings of tlie Trade and Labour Assembly in the Bricklayers' Hall. This church has no creed, no parson, and no collection. Notwith- standing this, Mr. Pomeroy, like many other working men, is still in the stage in which the infliction of summary punishment upon the scab and the blackleg is not merely regarded as a venial oftence, but as a positive duty. Their argument is on this wise. The employers in defence of their interests and property employ hired ruffians such as the Pinkertons and the Coal and Iron Police to coerce and if needs be to kill unionists, therefore the unionists are justified in self- defence in treating those workmen who accept the protection of the Pinkertons as traitors to their order. As I said in writing on the Brotherhood of Labour in my book, " If Christ came to Chicago " : — • There is ample need for the advent of a Peter the Hermit if tlie social crisis in America is not to culminate in bloodshed. Tlie working people without allies have given no hostages to fortune, and have no visible reason fn* refraining from violence. It is true that violence will injure them in the long-run far more than it can help them ; but like all men who suffer and who are weak, they think more of the immediate winning of a strike by knock- ing a few " scabs " on the head than of the permanent loss which such violence intlicts upon their cause. The fact that large numbers of labour men are at this moment in what in England we call tlje Broadhead stage of development — Broadhead being the secretary of the Sheffield Cutlers' Union, who used to hire men to kill and maim scabs or blacklegs — simply proves that they are more or less outlavved. If they were within the pale, if they had churches to back them, and news- papers to plead for them, and courts to do them justice, and their own trusted representatives on the bench and in Congress to see fair play, they would have long ere this emerged from the stage of incipient Thuggee in which many of them dwell. As tliey have no church to help them, they clutch the revolver ; and in default of an impartial judge to appeal to on the bench, they fetch the " scab " a clout over the head with a sandoag or a club. Every time they do this tl'.ey supply Mr. Carnegie and others with plausible justitication for the use of Pinkertons and of Gatling guns, and public opinion even among these who are most sympathetic is driven over to reinforce the enemies of labour. At the same time it is obvious enough that violence, although mistaken in the long run, may, and often does, win temporary victories. A case in point occurred during- a strike Tvhile I was in Chicago. K 2 132 ' Chicago To- Day. Some builders who were engaged in finishing one of the lofty buildings, the peculiar characteristic of Chicago, had a cjuarrel with their workmen. There is no necessity here to go into the merits of the dispute. The workmen asserted very loudly that the employers in question were violating a distinct understanding by virtue of wdiich wages had been settled for a period within which the dispute as to waojes arose. Workmen in Chicago always assure you that no employer dreams of keeping an agreement, no matter how solemnly it may have been arrived at or how carefully it may have been defined, any longer than he sees it to his interest to do so. This strike was mentioned as a case in point. There were any number of unemployed men in town who would gladly have taken the work in hand at any wages that miffht have been offered them. The moment these scabs or l>lacklegs were introduced the building was invested by unionist pickets, and if any stray blackleg could be caught alone on leaving his work he was pretty roughly handled. The lieat- inof and rouoh handlino; of blackleos w\as defended as a necessary act of war. it is curious as indicating the state of things in this great American city that the police, for reasons of their own, were undis- guisedly in ftivour of the strikers. The city treasury at that time was very short of money, and it had been proposed that the police should share in the general cut in wages, to which all the officials from the mayor downwards submitted. The ]Dolice ol^jected, and the force was full of incipient revolt when this strike occurred. A fellow-feeling makes one wondrous kind, and the police, over whose head was hanging the Damocles sword of a ten per cent, reduction in wages, fraternised with the strikers, whose assaults Labour and its Leaders. T33 on the blacklegs tliey were officially instructed to repel. There is reason to believe that both the mayor and the chief of the police had reasons of their own for not wishing to quarrel with organised labour, and as a result, and after a few days' resistance, the builders gave up the fight avowedly liecause they were unable to obtain police protection. A friend of mine who called at the headquarters of the unionists on the day of their victory, found them naturally very exultant. He asked them how it was that they were able to make such short work of the blacklegs. One of the pickets explained ingenuously that the police were of course compelled to intervene when- ever there was a conflict in the streets, but that as the assault almost always took place in a more or less tumultuous crowd, in the midst of which the police- man was compelled to use his clul), and, said the picket naively, " they usually contrived that the club fell upon the heads of the blacklegs and not on ours." It was only a comparatively trivial strike, but it illustrates one of the reasons why violence in trade disputes is not regarded as being such bad policy as it is in England. I first saw Mr. Pomeroy when he w^as presiding over the Trades and Labour Assembly on a Sunday afternoon. The Labour Parliament of Chicago is not the most orderly of deliberative assemblies, and I could not help admiring the skill and energy wdth which Mr. Pomeroy handled the gavel. " I wish you were Speaker of the House of Commons," said I to him. " Faith," said he with a smile, " and so do L" He is a man of ready wit and has supreme confidence in the magnetic and intellectual ascendency which he exercises over his fellows. He has a great eye for efi"ect and an innate power of command. For years 134 Chicago To-Day. lie has taken a leading part in good and ill repute in the labour unions, and is in thorough accord with the general feeling of his class, that Capital is the enemy. In the minds of the labour leaders the struggle for improved economic conditions is the present-day version of the War of Independence. To such men Carnegie is much more detestal)le than George the Third, and the Battle of Homestead is in the direct line of succession of the more famous battle of Bunker's Hill. Of this a curious illustration occurred at the eleventh annual meeting of the Illinois State Federation of Labour, which was held last year at Galesburgh. At that meeting Mr. Pomeroy was deputed to present a gavel to the chairman, Mr. Madden, of the Typographical Union, then acting as President of the Federation. He said : — I am delegated by Mr. John W. Connorton, of Chicago, to present a gavel to the President of this body. It is a gavel of historic interest. Various parts of it were made from a rifle captured from a Pinkerton detective during the battle at Homestead at the time of the great strike. The barrels, the stock, the screws were all put to service in the gavel. A brass button with the letter "P" on it is simk into the mallet. Tlie handle was made from tiie wood of the tree under which Major Andre was captured and where the three revolutionary heroes refused to accept his bribe. On the gavel is eiigiaved this inscription : " Captured Homestead, 1892. Presented to M. H. Madden, President Illinois State Federation of Labour, by John W. Con- norton." Mr. Pomeroy's conception of the position of affairs is best stated in his own words. He was a member of a special committee appointed last July to draw up an expression of the opinion of the Trades and Labour Assembly on the pardoning of the anarchists by Governor Altgeld. This statement, although couched in the somewhat hyperbolical style of the American orator, is well worthy the attention of those who wish to understand the real sentiments of the American working-man. Omitting the first page or two, in which Mr. Pomeroy traced the struggle of man for Labour and its Leaders. 135 freedom from tlie days of the Thirty Tyrants to the French Revolution, he says : — The Greek thought himself free until his homls were dangled before Ms eyes. Tlie Roman felicitated himself on his citizen.ship and limited franchise, and the Frencliman grew intoxicated in the frenzied belief that he liad given liberty to France. But the scales fell from their eyes, and they knew tiiat they had been following phantoms, and they saw Ihat they were still slaves. In our own Republic, wrested from the mother country by the valour of patriots, the star of liberty arose above a sunset of blood and carnage. The world has gazed on in wonderment at the giant strides of tlie young nation toward Ihe goal of success. But we have achieved commercial greatness at the expense of true liberty. Our grand ship of state, with sails full set, approaches the breakers. Ahead are hidden reefs and mighty whirlpools. Already she begins to swerve from her cliannel, and sails must be furled or she goes aground. Those in command have thrown aside the compass and are guiding by the dangerous magic of the mighty dollar. And we on board gaze aloft at her spreading sails, and seeing not the approaching storm, hearing but the sighing of the winds, with cheeks ruddy from the kisses of the lulling zephyrs, dream on and on the sweet dream of peace, while conditions shape themselves for strife. Wo see the grand structure which bears us on, and grow proud, and mayhap arrogant. We see not the b;unacles which eat their way through her staunch-looking hull. We salute the flag at the masthead, and with tears of joy and swelling heart boast of our beautiful ship, of her mighty power, of her spkndid crew. We exult too much of a condition which no longer exists, and declaring ourselves a liberty-loving people, imagine that we ore a liberly-enjoyiug people. We embrace the shadow of a fast vanishing substance and smile in our felicity while we delude ourselves with adoration for tiags and fireworks. We fondly imagine that each fold of our banner contains a mystic potency, guaranteeing something or other for our welfare, and at each report of the Chinese cannon our spirits rise to a point of almost fanatical exhilaration, and our hypnotism is complete. We point with scorn at the shortcomings of other lands, and compare our "glorious achievenients" and "heretofore never enjoyed citizenship " with what we term the age of tyrants and oppressors. Yet from the thirty tyrants of Greece, Caligula, and Nero, with their Praetorian guard, to Bonfield, Schaack and Grinuell, though a wide stej) in the cycles of time, shows no improvements for the better in methods of per- secution and tyranny, the perceptible difference being the additional refine- ment displayed by the moderns in vouchsafing a trial to their foredoomed victims, before a prejudiced judge and a packed jury. From the Brazen Lion of Venice, wiih its depository fcr anonymous denunciator.^ dooming to death by the stealthy stiletto-wielder, to Pinkerlon, with his hireling spies, fomentors of trouble and bearers of false-witness, is but a change from one system of strangling liberty to another, equally as abhorrent, equally as vile; the diftereuce being that the assassination wns accomplished in the name of an absolute monarcli of a subdued people, while the Pinkertou works solely at the dictates of the man of money, and under the fliig of freedom. From Boadicea, weeping for her daughters outraged before her face by the Roman camp followers, to the American mother of toil, who sees the con- ditions so swiftly changing that her offspring must shortly sell honour to maintain body and life together, may appear a far-fetched comparison, yet the close observer of the trend of affairs can, without being too imaginative, 136 Chicago To-Day. see himself at this clay confronted with this very sad condition ; tlie per* ceptible diiference being that the daughters of Britain's Queen were made the victims of a savage warfare waged by a relentless enemy in an age of barbarism, while the daughters of the American poor are becoming the forced victims of necessity in an age of civilisation and in a land of plenty. From the blood-sweating slaves in the mines of Siberia to the blood- sweating slaves in the mines of Pennsylvania and Spring Valley is no wide sweep of thought, and both exist painfully apparent, the one vieing with the other in the horrors of human servitude. True the flag of the Czar of Russia guards one, while the flng of the Czar Necessity upholds the other. One exists under an absolute monarchy, the other an absolute despotism, the only observable distinction being that Siberia furnishes food and shelter for its bond slaves, wliile this can hardly be claimed for the bond slaves of America. From the bastille of, France, now vanished, to the bastilles of America, plainly apparent in the Pinkerton sweat-boxes, is but a transfereuce of despotism from the soil of France to the soil of tlie United States. From the militarism of Germany to tlie militarism of Coeur de Alenes is but a single step, and that step planted on the necks of American freemen. From the Mameluke guards, stabbing and tliying at tlie dictates of a tyrant, strangling freedom of speccli at the nod of a dictator, to the money-purchased thugyism of this modern and enlightened Republic is many strides in advance, both in time and in atrocity. And nowhere in history can we find examples of wanton bloodshed and murder so vividly depicted as meet our horrified gaze right here in our own land, in our own time, in this age of commercial ascendancy and Christianity. For example, we mention East St. Louis, the Union Stock Yards, the Black Road, and the more recent butcheiies at Homrstead and Lemoiit. The ancient Mame- lukes were given immunity by an absolute despot. Tiie modern JMamelukes are put aboard train and deported to another State, and, unwhipped of justice, grow in power. True, the ancient Mamelukes seized as their own the land which had fostered and maintained them, and the growing strength of their modern com[ieers points the possibility of some such enterprise on their part. And summing up the evidences of the damning decay of the fabric of our inherited liberties, retrospecting on things that were, and analysing things that are, we must truthfully admit that we have been derelict in protecting and fostering our sacred heritage torn from the womb of a thousand battles. Condemning anarchy, we must necessarily condemn the conditions whence it springs, and condemn the absolutism which is its other extreme. One must perish with the other, but neither by the other. Palaces must not be erected for the one and prisons for the other. The perpetuation of one means the perpetuation of the other. Both must be eliminated along constitutional grounds, and the cause of their existence accompany tliem. Before the tribunals of justice all men must be on an equality. The blind goddess must indeed be blind. Public clamoiu-, so dangerous to the preser- vation of the rights of man, must have no voice within the hearing of the judgment seat. No classes must be known, no beliefs aired as criminating or exculpatory evidence. Acts must be proved, not inferred. The ermine must remain as unspotted as the summer snows on the mountain peak ; as fixed as the polar star, as unchanging as the decrees of fate, as unswerving as time itself must Justice tempered with mercy be decreed. Therefore we deem this epoch propitious for a note of warning sounded in the eai's of our fellow-workers. We believe the time is at hand when organised laboin-, loyal to the principles of freedom as enunciated by Patrick Labour and its Leaders. 1 37 Henry and Thomas Jefferson, should give the alarm which we hopa may result in a restoration of our common country to the paths of true liberty, wherein, as Jackson declared, " Every man and each man in this country hy tlie otemal must and shall be tree." VVorkiug to the accomplishment of this end, thoroughly aroused to the necessity for immediate action, fully aware of tlie danger of procrastination, and determined to recognise and utilise all honourable expedients toward attaining our object, and cheerfully hailing those signs of the changing times wliich tend to a recovery by the people of their just rights, and ever ready to lend honour to whom honour is due, ever ready to award approval for all actions in accord with justice and humanity. . . . The remainder of the message, which is written by Mr. Madden, eulogises Governor Altgeld as the em- bodiment of all that has descended from the fathers of the revolution. I may add in concluding this very brief sketch of Mr, Pomeroy and the Trade and Labour Assembly, that quite recently Mr. Pomeroy, Mr. Madden, and some other meinl)ers of the Illinois Federation of Labour and the Chicago Trades and Labour Asseml)ly struck out on a new line in attempting to provide for planting out of the unemployed on the land. Such at least was the original idea, but the scheme as at present formulated is more interesting as an attempt to estaljlish an ideal community than as a practical proposal to plant the surplus population of the cities upon the land. The following account of their scheme is taken from the Chica.ijo Herald of June 10 : — The members of the Chicago Labour Organisations have organised an association for the purpose of acquiring possession of four square miles of land in the territory owned by the Land of Sunshine Company in Southern California, this to be subdivided into tracts of twenty acres each with the exception of a square in the middle, which will be held in common and adapted to the general use of the land owners. In the centre of the smaller square will be a circular park, bordered by the main street, facing which will be the residences. It is the plan to build in this park the village building and school, the stores occupying one block and the shops another. These will be under the immediate control of the land owners organised into a democratic form of government and controlled as are public buildings in the city. Behind the circle of dwellings will be a comparatively small btrip of land devoted to kitchen gardening and pasturage. From this circular drive-way, which is the border of the village park, it is planned to build eight roads that will reach to the sides of the tract. Four 138 Chicago To- Day. of these will stretch diagonally from the drive-way to the corners of the tract. The other four will connect the drive- way with the points marking the middle of each side. Another rond will divide the sides into quarters and join the main diagonal roads in the middle. Between these roads 112 plots of twenty acres each will be laid out, each one facing on a roadway, and the farthest side of the one on the remote edge of the tract will be but 280 rods from the dwelling. " It has been our experience," said M. H. Madden, president of the asso- ciation, '• that the principal rea-oa labouring men who have lived for years in the city object to becoming farmers is the fact that were they to make such a change it would necessitate their living on a farm remote from neighbours. This is the one great objection brought by the men and the members of their families. In this plan the objection is obviated. The men can not only live together, but they will not bo compelled to be too close together. Thosy will live facing beautiful grounds, whicii is much better than the way most of them now live in congested districts and poorly-constructed houses. Hy the plan we present the jx'ople will be given plenty of breathing room, and at tho same time will be afforded tho pleasure of one another's society. It is the plan to construct in the centre of the ground a school building and build up an excellent educational institution, and have as well a theatre and halls for public me .'tings. The government of the village will be the same as the government of any village. Every resident will have a voice and vote in its alfairs. There is every promise that we will have excellent success with tlie plan. AVe not only hope by this that we may establish this little village, where the poor man can be contented, but that we will demonstrate tho feasibility of the jjlan, and that others like it will become established, to the end that the i:)opulation that is now drifting to the cities may be turned back and the country districts have at least their share of the population. " The lands we visited in California pleased us very much. The soil is very productive and systems of irrigation have been made very complete. The twenty-acre tracts raising fruit will support a family well and yield a profit." Under the plan as formulated ninety acres will be devoted to the dwellLug circle and parks, 170 acres to the pasturage and gardening grounds. The individual holdings will amount to 2,200 acres. Not more than one tract will be sold to any one person, so that the village will contain no aristocrats. Mr. Pomeroy is the General Organiser of the American Federation of Labour, a body which corre- sponds to our Trades Union Congress. It met last year in Chicago. The president of this federation is Mr. Samuel Gompers, the following account of whom recently appeared in the American Review of Reviews, from the pen of Dr. Albert Shaw : — In Clinton Place, New York, a few doors west of Broadway, and a few minutes' walk from the offices of the Review of Reviews, one finds on the lintel of an old house, once a residence but now an office Laho2ir and its Leaders. 139 Iniilding, a modest sign that reads : " The American Federation of Labour, Samuel Uompers, President." The halls are rather dark and dingy, and one climbs two flio;hts to find the rooms of t]ie Federation. But the journey will be worth while if the caller is fortu- nate enough to find Mr. Gompers at his desk. He is not prone to careless absence from his place of work, but the manifold duties of his position frequently take him to distant parts of the country. The quarters of the American Federation are unadorned enough to allay any suspicion that the chief officers of this crreat combination of the trades unions of the country are disposed to revel in luxurious appoint- ments. Everything is as severely plain as it can be ; and the stiff common chairs invite no loiterers. Order and system are evident at a glance, and the experienced observer is quickly satisfied that the affairs of the Federation are in methodical and com- petent hands. Mr. Samuel Gompers has been heard ])y many audiences besides those comjDOsed of working men and members of the constituent orders of the Federa- tion. He is a short but massively framed man of perhaps forty-five years, with a strong and handsome face and suave manner, a business-like yet not too abrupt deportment, and a diction as discriminating and clear as one is taught to expect from a college professor. Mr. Gompers certainly exhibits great gifts of lucid expression, whether on the platform or in private conversation. He possesses a singularly well- balanced temperament, the key to which seems to be a cheerful optimism tempered by natural caution and held in bounds, though not repressed, by experience and responsibility. Mr. Gompers represents trades unionism upon its 140 Chicago To-Day. best estabiislied lines. He was born in London forty- four years ago, and at ten years of age was put at work in a factory, continuing liis elementary studies at a night school. He left the shoemaker's trade, SAMUEL GOMPERS. which he did not like, and was apprenticed to learn the trade of a cigar maker. At thirteen he was brought to the United States, and became a member of the International Cigar Makers' Union. He as- sumed activity in that body, and as a delegate to Laboiir and its Leaders. 141 the early conventions of the American Federation of Labour was recognised as a natural leader and intrusted with various offices, and soon with the presidency. As an editor of labour papers, he has earned the right to rank with the successful journal ists of the country. At present Mr. Gompers' jour- nalistic labours are confined to the editing of the American Federationist, a monthly magazine that is the official organ of the Federation of Labour. Its first number appeared in March, 1894. It is intelli- gently and broadly edited. Its articles are short, but pithy, and from good sources. For example, the opening contribution in the June number is from Tom Mann, the English labour leader ; Grace H. Dodge writes of working girls' clubs ; Alice L. Wood- bridge of women's labour ; Edward Thimme of child labour ; and there are many other admirable bits of contribution, correspondence and editorial comment. Miss Frances Willard sends the Federationist a hearty greeting, and every page of this June number indi- cates breadth of view on the part of the editor, and a desire to bring the labour movement into the intelli- gent sympathy of right-minded men and women everywhere. It is for the peaceful and lawful evolution of in- dustrial conditions that Mr. Gompers has always stood. He has never for a moment swerved from the doctrine that the policy of the labour movement, as represented by trades unionism, should aim always to secure hi^h waoes and a reduction in the hours of labour, these two things meaning improved conditions and surroundings that must have far-reaching and beneficent results. The competitive industrial system seeks to conquer the markets of the world by selling cheap, Mr. Gompers would declare ; and hitherto the 142 Chicago To-Day. . burden of this competition has been placed chiefly upon the shoulders of labour. The combination of workmen in trades unions is for the purpose of throwing back part of this burden upon the shoulders of the capitalist class, who in order to still compete must be content with smaller profits. He has been described in a labour paper as " an eminently prac- tical man, belonging to that school of unionists who believe in high dues, thorough organisation, perfect discipline, sick benefits, death benefits, out-of-work benefits, travelling benefits, and maintaining an ag- gressive position at all times for higher wages and shorter hours of labour." The American editor of the Review of Reviews made Mr. Gompers a neighbourly call the other day to exchange views with him upon the coal strike, and upon various questions of the day that have to do with the prevaibng social unrest. " I see no immediate or early possibility," said Mr. Gompers, " of a com- ])lete agreement, in settlement of the coal dispute, that shall include all the !?tatesand mining districts that are involved. The effect of the uncontrolled competition of the Southern Illinois district with those that lie beyond it, north, south, west and east, is such that for the present a settlement all alon^ the line seems to be out of the question. There is nothing to do but to c'oso the strike by separate agreements in the different coal-mining territories involved, and then proceed to bring the Southern Illinois miners into a state of more perfect organisation so that in future their district may not be a source of disturbance to tlie coal-mining interests of the entire country. " But," IVIr. Gompers continued, " althougli tiiis year's coal strike is not to be teiminated upon principles as sweeping in their application ns one could desire, I wish to say emphatically that I regard this great strike, in spite of its numerous unfortunate incidents, as an essentially fortunate thing, not only for the cause of organised labour but also for the general economic and industrial interests of the United States. The financial panic of last year, with its attendant industrial depression, led a general attempt on the part of capital engaged in the employment of labour to sliarply curtail the consum- ing power of the masses of the people by diminishing their ability to purchase • — tiiat is, by a general reduction of wages. This movement against labonr made its way through various great fields of employment. In the railroad world it was resisted by the strikers on the Great Northern system, whose final success in arbitration has helped to check the downward tendency. But the most typical instance of the aggressive movement among the employing class against the workers was in the mining field and especially in that of Labou7' and its Leaders. 143 bituminous coal miniug. The great strike was a notice served upon capital that the whole world of organised labour had determined to take a stand, to face about, and not only to resist further aggression but to endeavour to gain back some of the ground thnt had been lost. With the success nf Ihis stand, — for tlie miners have in most of the districts concerned gained all or a considerable part of their demands, — it is evident tliat there is a turn in the tide. Wages in general are not to decline any further, but on the contrary are to tend upwards. And with better pay the people will require larger supplies of standard commodities and the wheels of industry will be quick- ened in many directions. It is not true," Mr. Gompers further continued, "that the miners have really suffered anything in the loss of wages during the weeks of enforced closing down of the mines. They will gain back all the time apparently lost by more steady employment hereafter. It is only approximately a certain volume of output that the country can consume in any case, and if through a strike the miners can secure a higher wage per ton it is clear that their total wages upon a year's output will be increased by so much." Mr. Gompers was asked to express himself as to arbitration in industrial disputes, and especially as to the possibility of some form of compulsory arbitra- tion. He replied that he was most assuredly in favour of arbitration : — " As for ' compulsory arbitration,' however," ho continued, " the two words seem to me antithetical. Arbitration always involves a compromise. The conditions under which it usually comes about arc those which have led each of the parties in dispute somewhat to fear and somewhat to respect the other. The employing interest is usually the stronger. But when, tlirough careful organisation, the cmploj'ees attain a position which commands the respectful attention of the representatives of capital, it becomes possible to confer together successfully and to seciu'e a reference of disinites for the desired settlement by arbitration. I see no means by which legal compulsion to arbitrate could be made really beneficial to the party that is usuall}^ the weaker. It would be an instrumentality that might react dangerously against the progress of organised labour. The labuur movement has too much at stake and has too slender means at its command to indulge in dubious experiments. The weapons that it now uses have been tested by long experience, and their use is understood and also their limitations." Against the idea that an occasional outbreak or scene of disorder in connection with a strike was the essence of the labour movement, Mr. Gompers pro- tested earnestly : — " The real labour movement," said he, " goes on unnoticed by the news- papers and unwitnessed by the public. At this moment, while we discuss the question, there are probably thousands of committees of trades unions and labour organisations in conference with employers in the shops and counting rooms of the country. For every strike that occurs, scores of ques- tions are settled by quiet conference between groups of organised working- 14 4 Chicago To-Day . men and their employers. The strikes are unfortunate and to be regretted, hut they are a part of the existing industrial order and serve their purpose. They should not be indulged in without great caution, but sometimes they are necessary, and their general result is beneficial upon the whole. It is always to be noticed that employers fight most stubbornly and ruthlessly in their first experience of a strike. They are much more disposed to negotiate and compromise when subsequent disputes arise." With regard to the attitude of the American Federation of Labour upon public questions, Mr. Gompers stated that the order is committed to the doctrine of the free coinage of silver at the ratio of one to sixteen, regardless of the success of attempts to secure international agreement. He regarded Coxeyism and the industrial army movements rather as evidences of social unrest and incidental phenomena than as occurrences having any primary or vital sig- nificance in themselves. With Mr. Coxey's doctrine of non-interest-bearing bonds Mr. Gompers could find no theoretical fault. In fact, his words were friendly rather than otherwise for the financial propositions that Mr. Coxey has advocated. As a practical matter, however, he did not consider that proposals to deal radically with the currency and the national debt are timely or advisable. In a general way, the American Federation has for some years been committed to the doctrine of an income tax. Mr. Gompers expressed himself as personally adverse to the exemption line in the pending bill, and as in favour of a tax that should reach all incomes of self-supporting men, no matter how small. He would, however, employ the priiici23le of a graduated tax, increasing \\\q, rate as incomes increased which were therefore better able to contribute to the pulilic treasury. The interview was ended by the following state- ment regarding the aims of the Federation : — The American Federation of Labour actively participates in every eifort made by thinking men to secure amelioration in their ccuditiou, economically, fcocially, and politically, and often initiates movements tending towards those Labour and its Leaders. 145 purposes. Sut the organisation, as such, is particularly committed to the shorter hours movement, or what is more popularly known as the Eight- Hour movement, the leaders all agreeing that the movement which gives the workers more leisure brings more intelligence and consequently more iu- dependenee, more sterling qualities of character and truer progi'ess. The Federation has accomplished wonders in this movement for a shorter work- day, and millions of workers now enjoy countless golden hours of rest, leisure, and opportunity as the result of the concentrated efforts of 1886 and 1890. The American Federation of Labour dates from about 1880, and is therefore some fourteen years old. It includes about seventy-five distinct trades unions, with an aggregate membership of from six hundred thousand to seven hundred thousand individuals. Some of these unions, like those of the carpenters, bricklayers, cigar makers, coal miners, iron moulders, steel workers, and printers, are very large and strong ; while others, owing to the nature of the craft which they represent, are small in membership, though often very complete and effective in organisation. The only other labour organisation in America which can compare with the Federation of Labour is the Knights of Labour. This organisation, in 1886 had not fewer than 700,000 members, 600,000 of whom had joined in the course of that year. But American labour unions fluctuate very greatly, and the Knights of Labour are a very signal illustration of this fact. In 1880 they numbered 300 in Chicago, in 1886 they rose to 22,000, in 1893 they had fallen again to 300. When I left Chicago they were pros- pering, and their numbers were estimated at 40,000. Mr. Powderly, who until quite recently was the Grand Master Workman, has been expelled the order. The rock upon which the Knights split was their antagonism to trades unions, a rock which they have assiduously endeavoured to avoid under the guidance of the present Grand Master Workman, Mr. Sove- reign. Mr. Detweiler, a well-known Chicago unionist, L 1 46 Chicago To-Day . writing on the work of the Knights in the past, says : — • Since the first general assembly of the Knights of Labour, many reforms that are of direct value to the labouring classes have been accomplifihed. Labour bureaus have been established in nearly all the Northern States. Laws for the sanitation, safety and comfort in workshops, factories and stores have been adopted. Trades unions have become recognised social factors ; weekly pay-days have been largely adopted. Child labour has been regu- lated to some extent, and good men and women are still doing earnest and ex- cellent work in that direction. The inhuman method of working convicts by contractors is being rapidly abolished. Laws to prohibit the bringing of foreign labour under contract to the United States have been passed. A fair effort has been made to enforce these laws. The hours of labour have been shortened to a greater extent than casual observers would imagine. There are probably 500,000 workmen in the United States who labour only eight hours a day, and as many more whose hours of toil liave been reduced from twelve, fourteen, and sixteen hours to ten. All this may be said to be a direct result of the agitation inaugurated and largely directed by the Knights of Labour. The printed cards of the organisers of the Knights, some of whom I had the advantao-c of meetina; when in Chicago, set forth that they secure their members $4, or I65. a week, sick benefit, and $50, or <£10, for funeral expenses. THE KNIGHTS OF LABOUR Is the greatest labour organisation the world has ever seen. It is the only organisation which, while striving to secure for wage-workers the best possible terms as to wages, hours and conditions, aims at reforming the causes of industrial injustice. It secures to each trade and locality absolute control over his own trade or local affairs, yet its perfect organisation enables its members to act unitedly and promptly, therefore effectively, when concentrated action becomes necessary to remedy injustice or to resist oj)pre&sion. It is pledged to work for the overthrow of the capitalistic system of pro- duction and exchange, yet realising that reforms can only be beneficial and permanent when they rest upon the convictions of a wisely educated people, it seeks to accomplish its objects only by appeals to reason and conscience — never by force. It is a secret organisation only as far as secrecy is necessary to protect its members from wrong and persecution, and can never be used to shield wrong- doing. Its doors are open to all who labour honestly and usefully, cither by hand or brain, without question or discrimination on account of creed, race, or nationality. The present strength of the Knights of Labour is estimated at 325,000. One great difference between Labour and its Leaders. 147 the Knio-lits of Lal)oiir and tlie Federation of Labour is that the Federation objects to uniting men in any other than strictly class organisations, whereas the principle of the organisation of the Knights is that their component minor bodies should include labour- ing men of all conditions. In this they resemble the American Railway Union, with which, in June last, they formed a hearty alliance, l)eing affiliated and conjoined for the purpose of uniting the mem])ers of both organisations in a close bond of harmony for the better advancement of the world of labour. The Knights in one respect are better than any of the other lal)our organisations, inasmuch as thoy resolutely refuse to make any distinction as to the sex, race or colour of their members. In politics tlic programme of all these associations is practically tlic same, although it must be admitted that for the most part it is in the air, and cannot be regarded as counting for very much with the caucuses which draw up platforms for the two parties which divide American politics between them. The last approved programme is as follows : — We re-affirm our allegiance to the principles set forth in the Omaha platform, and recommeuil to the favourable consideration of the People'a Party State Convention the following platform of the Federation of Labour, ado|)ted at Chicago December, 1S93, and tlius secure the union of all labour and farmer organisations f)r the purpose of consolidating and uniting tiie active industrialists and agricult'.irists in one harmonious political party :— 1. Compulsory education. 2. Direct legislation. 3. A legal eight-hour work day. 4. Sanitary inspection of workshop, mine, and home. 5. Liability of employers for injury to healtli, body, or life. G. The abolition of the contract system in all public work. 7. The abolition of the sweating system. 8. The municipal ownership of street cars and gas and electric plants for public distribution of light, heat, and power. 9. The nationalisation of telegraphs, telephones, railroads, and mines. 10. The collective ownership by the iJoople of all mears cf production and distribution. 11. The principle of referendum in all legislation. L 2 148 Chicago To-Day. I now come to the American Eailway Union, whick is playing the most conspicuous part in the present strike. I had not the good fortune of meeting Mr. Debs, whose name has become so familiar to newspaper readers ; but I had a long and interesting conversation with his right-hand man, who shares with him the notoriety and the peril of arrest for the part which he has taken in the present strike. Mr. Eogers, the editor of the Railway Times, is a very sensible, straightforward man, whose ambition it is to convert the Railway Times, which is at present a fortnightly paper, into the daily organ of the railway employees. Eugene Debs, of Terre Haute, Indiana, like Mr. Gompers, was born in Eng- land, and has brouoht his EUGENE DEUS. English common-sense to of railway employees, as one of the ablest movement. Locomotive bear upon the organisation He has lono; been recoo-nised men engaged in the labour He was Secretary of the Brotherhood of Firemen and editor of the Locomotive Firemen's Magazine. For years he has recognised the fact that the railway employees were powerless until they were combined. Before the formation of the American Eailway Union each class of railway employees had its own union, and they very frequently refused to act together, with the result that they were defeated in detail. There was no need for the railway magnates to resort to the usual expedient of Labour and its Leaders, 149 dividing in order to conquer, for the unions were so bitterly divided among tliemselves that the companies had it all their own way. In the old days the locomotive ensfineers would have nothina; to do with the locomotive firemen, and the switchmen consorted with none but switchmen, the railway telegraphists were equally exclusive, while the railway trainmen and the railway conductors practised the exclusive policy as far as they could. Frequent attempts were made to federate these bodies so as to have a supreme council, but the federated unions were . so jealous of their council that the efforts came to nothing. Mr. Debs, after much studying of the causes of this failure, came to the conclusion that a closer union of the rank and file was necessary and that the power of the officers must be curtailed. He wanted an ora-anisation which would reconcile the two apparently contradictory principles of strict trades-unionism and general organisation of all the men. He conceived the plan of organisation to con- sist of lodges, which were composed exclusively of the several branches of the railroad service, but were united as lodges of one general body, the idea being that to each branch of the service should be left the adjustment of such matters as affected that branch peculiarly and exclusively and could be handled by it without outside assistance, the general body being called upon to take charge of all matters of common interst to all railroad men, and to back up any in- dividual branch if it proved to be too weak by itself to enforce such demands as the organisation at large might consider proper and just. In a general way the idea is similar to that which underlies the American Federation of Labour. It combines the trades union principle with that qf the Knights of 150 Chicago To- Day. Labour, which is expressed in the words " an injury to one is the concern of all." Having conceived this idea, Mr. Debs set to work to realise it. He is an eloquent man and an energetic organiser, and he had his paper, the Locomotive Fire- men s Magazine, with which to enforce his views. After pointing out to the railway employees that the result of his scheme would increase their strength, and at the same time reduce their contributions to the central fund, he succeeded in securing recruits by the thousand, and at the beginning of this year the American Eailway Union, one of the largest labour unions in the country, of which he is president and founder, was accomplished. The following is his declaration of principles, which is not only interesting in itself, but sets forth on the best authority the views of some of the ablest labour men in America on the present position of labour on the railways. lu the creation of a new organisation of railway emjiloyees, certain reasons prompting tlie movement are demanded and sliould be set forth with becoming candour. The number of employees now in the service of the railroads in America has been variously estimated from 800,000 to 1,000,000. It is safe to assume that this vast army of employees is, at the present time, not less than 1,000,000. Accepting the highest claims of tha various railway organisations as a basis of calculation, less than 150,000 of these employees are members of such organisations, leaving more than 850,000 who are not enrolled in the ranks of organised labour. To state the proposition concisely, organisation is union. It is a self-evident truth that " in union there is strength," and conversely, without union weak- ness prevails ; therefore, the central benefit to be derived from organisation is strength, — power to accomplish that which defies individual effort. Experience, the great teacher, whose lessons, soont;r or later, must be heeded, points out with unerring certainty the defects, and demonstrates the inefficiency of the organisations as they now exist : First. — They do not provide for all classes of employees, it being shown that 850,000 of ihcra, or eighty-five per cent, of the whole number, remain un- organised. These may be divided into three general classes : (1) those who are eligible but decline to join ; (2) those who have been expelled because of their inability or refusal to bear the financial burdens which membership imposes, and (3) the multiplied thousands in various departments of the service who are totally ineligible, there being no provision for their admission. These fact?, in the light of thirty years of organisation, establish, beyond Labour and its Leaders. 151 all controversy, the truth of the declarations herein set forth, and emphasise the demand for an order in which there shall be room and protection for all whose hearts throb responsive to union si.-ntiraents, and whose desire it is to march under union banners in the great struggle for the triumph of union principles. Second. — The existing organisations, designed to promote and preserve harmonious relations between employer and employee, Iiave met with only limited success, if, indeed, it can be sliown that any progress in that direction has been made. Never has tliere existed tliat mutual confidence without which it were misleading to assume tiiat peace, amity and good-will prevail. At best, therefore,. this relation, between employer and employee has been little better than an enforced compliance with conditions rarely satisfactory to either party. Third. — What must be said of organisations which have failed to establish friendship and good- will even among themselves? From the first there have existed antagonisms and jealousies, culminating in warring factions instead of a harmonious whole. Organisation has been pitted against organisation, bringing upon themselves not only disaster but lasting reproach. Fourth. — Protection is the cardinal principle of thu present organisations ; but they do not protect. Since "an injury to one is the concern of all," a failure to protect all is an exhibition of a purpose without the power to enforce it, and this fact emphasises the necessity of the federation 'i organisations, but which under existing conditions is impracticable, if not impossible. Fifth. — It is universally conceded that one of the most serious objections to the existing organisations is their excessive cost to the membership, the sum totals of which, were the facts known, would amaze the labour world. So enormous have they become, that tens of thousands, unable to bear the burden, have been forced back into the ranks of the unorganised. Sixtli. — Another defect in existing organisations is their secrecy, as for instance, the secret ballot, by virtue of which tliousands of worthy applicants have been excluded. The air of mystery surrounding their proceedings is not calculated to inspire confidence. On the contrary, in the relations between employer and employee, in carrying forward great enterprises in which the people at large are profoundly interested, mystery is not required, and is productive of suspicion and distrust. Open, fearless and above-board work is far more in consonance with the spirit of independence and free institutions. Seventh. — The tremendous power conferred upon chief officers has been a source of wide-spread dissatisfaction. The mere dictum of an individual determines whether a strike, involving thousands of employees and millions of dollars, shall or shall not occur. He is, in this sense, an absolute monarch. From his decision there is no appeal. The unanimous vote of the organisation cannot prevail against it. Such autocratic power vested in a single person is not only dangerous to a degree tiiat defies exaggeration, but is at war with the American idea of government, in which the one-man rule has no place. The responsibility often involved in a final decision is too great and too grave to rest upon any one man, however sturdy his integrity or unerring his judgment. Eighth. — The subject of grievances and grievance committees has itself become a grievance that cries aloud for correction. The petty complaints that ceaselessly arise among employees, and keep them in a state of agitation and unrest, have brought odium upon organisations and weakened their power for good in directions where real grievances demand adjustment. 152 Chicago To-Day. The very term " grievance committee " has become a reproach and a by- word. This brood of evils is in a large measure due to the personal jealousies and enmities flowing out of the inliarmonious relations existing between organi- sations, each of which seeks supremacy without regard to the welfare of the other. The complex grievance machinery entailing prolonged delays, the vast number of local, general and joint committees — an army in themselves — are well calculated to increase rather than diminish grievances. For every complaint that is remedied anotlier takes its place, and thus they multiply, until railway oflScials lose patience and seek refuge in refusal to make further concessions. Such petty grievances as are herein indicated ought not to exist at all, and once correct methods of organisation are inaugurated, will entirely dis- appear. Righteous complaints and just demands are always in order, and should receive prompt attention and be pressed to a speedy and satisfactory adjustment. Ninth. — Organisations have become so numerous and their annual and biennial conventions occur so frequently, that the question of furnishing free transportation for delegates, their families and friends, is being seriously considered by railway ofHcials as an abuse of privileges without a redeeming feature. This incessant demand for special trains, special cars, the recogni- tion of credentials, and passes without limit, is compromising the character and dignity of organisations, and placing their oflicers and members under obligations which must, sooner or later, in view of the constant agitation for increased pay and other concessions, prove a soiu'ce of embarrassment and humiliation. Tenth. — The extraordinary fact cannot be overlooked, that while present organisations are provided with expensive striking and boycotting machinery, and while millions of dollars, wrung from their members, have been ex- pended in support of strikes, they have with scarcely an exception been overwhelmed with defeat. The history of railroad strides, as conducted by railroad organisations, is a recital of brave but hopeless struggle, of strikers defeated, impoverished, black-listed, pursued and driven to the extremity of scabbing or starvation. Under present conditions this result is inevitable, and a century of organisation on present lines will not change it. Railway employees have contributed from their earnings untold millions in support of organisations, and are, therefore, entitled to protection instead of promises that can never be fulfilled. It cannot be denied that the policy of present organisations has filled the land with scabs, who swarm in the highways and byways awaiting anxiously, eagerly, the opportunity to gratify their revenge by taking positions vacated by strikers. Thoughtful men have no difficulty in accounting for the failure of railroad strikes. Neither are they at a loss to suggest a remedy. Organised upon correct principles, governed by just laws and animated by unselfish purposes, the necessity for strikes and boycotts among railway employees will disappear. Experience teaches that defective organisation leads to strikes and defeat as certainly as perfect organisation will insure peace and success. Eleventh. — The ever increasing body of idle engineers, conductors, etc., seeking in vain for employment, is the legitimate fniit of promotion on the seniority basis. The pernicious effects of this system can scarcely be over- estimated. A lifetime of faithful service counts for nothing. When dis- missal comes, ofttimes for trivial offence, the victim finds the doors of his calling everywhere barred against him. Ho is conipelled to go to the very Labour and its Leaders. 153 bottom and serve again his entire apprenticeship. The natural tendency is to weaken organised labour by creating a surplus of experienced men whose necessities make them available to corporations in recruiting their service in .times of trouble. It is not strange that the victims of the seniority iniquity renounce organisation and take their place with the unorganised. What is required is a system of promotion that recognises and rewards merit rather than seniority. Other things being equal, seniority should, of course, have preference. In filling vacancies selections should be made from the line of promotion and from the unemployed in a ratio evincing duo regard to the rights of both. The American Railway Union will include all classes of railway em- ployees, separately organised, yet all in harmonious alliance with one great brotherhood. There will be one supreme law for the order with provisions for all classes, one roof to shelter all, each separate and yet all united when unity of action is required. In this is seen the federation of classes which is feasible, instead of the federation of organisations, which has proved to be utterly impracticable. The reforms sought to be inaugurated and the benefits to be derived therefrom, briefly stated, are as follows : — • First. — The protection of members in all matters relating to wages and their rights as employees is the principal purpose of the organisation. Railway employees are entitled to a voice iu fixing wages and determining conditions of employment. Fair wages and proper treatment must be the return for efficient service, faithfully performed. Such a policy insures harmonious relations and satisfactory results. The new order, while pledged to conservative methods, will protect the humblest of its members in every right he can justly claim. But while the rights of members will be sacredly guarded, no intemperate demand or unreasonable proposition will be entertained. Corporations will not be permitted to treat the organisation better than the organisation will treat them. A high sense of lionour must be the ani- mating spirit, and even-handed justice the end sought to be attained. Thoroughly organised in every department,' with a due regard for the right wherever found, it is confidently believed that all dififerencrs may be satisfactorily adjusted, that harmonious relations may be established and maintained, that the service may be incalculably improved, and that the necessity for strike and lockout, boycott and blacklist, alike disastrous to em- ployer and emplovee, and a perpetual menace to the welfare of the public, will for ever disappear. Second. — In every department of labour, the question of economy is forced to the front by the logic of necessity. The importance of organisation is con- ceded, but if it costs more than a working man is able to pay, the benefits to accrue, however great, are barred. Theiefore, to bring the expenses of organisation within the reach of all, is the one thing required, a primary question which must be settled before those who stand most in need, can participate in the benefits to be derived. The expenditures required to maintain subordinate and grand lodges, every dollar which is a tax upon labour, operate disastrously in two ways, first by repelling men who believe in organisation, and second by expelling members because of inability to meet the exactions, and in both of which the much vaunted fraternity feature, it is seen, is based entirely upon the ability to pay dues. In this it is noted that the organisations, as now conducted, are for men, ag a general proposition, who have steady work at fajr pay, while others 1 54 Chicago To-Day, less fortunate in tliese regards, are forced to remain ouiside to be the victims of uncharitable criticism. Hence, to reduce the cost to the lowest practicable point is a demand strictly in accord witli the fundamental principles of economy. This reduction of cost, the new organisation proposes to accomplish in a way that, while preserving every feature of efficiency that can be claimed by existing organisations, will so minimise expenses that members will not be forced to seek relief, as is now the case, in the abandonment of organisation. To accompliah this reduction a number of burdens such as grand and sub- ordinate lodges, annual and biennial conventions, innumerable grievance committees, etc., will be eliminated. As these unnecessary features will not exist, the entire brood of taxes necessary to maintain them will be unknown, i Third. — The new or,i;anisatiou will have a number of departments, each of whicli will be designed to promote the welfare of the membership in a prac- tical way and by practical motliods. The best thought of working men has long sought to solve the problem of making labour organisations protective, not only against sickness, disability and death, but against the ills consequent upon idleness, and those which follow in its train : hence there will be estab- lished an employment department in whicli it is proposed to register the name of every member out of employment. Tlie department will also be fully in- formed where work may be obtained. It is doubtful if a more important feature could be suggested. It evidences fraternal regard witliout a fee, benevolence without alloy. Fourth. — In the establishment of a department of education, a number of important features are contemplated, as, for instance, lectures upon subjects relating to economics, such as wages, expenses, the relations of employer and employee, strikes, tlieir moral and financial aspects, etc. In tliis connection a daily paper will be established, whose mission it will be to advocate measures and policies in which labour has vital interests, and also the publication of a standard monthly magazine, which will occupy a still broader field in the discussion of questions which engage the attention of the best writers and thinkers of the times. Fifth. — There will be a department designed to promote legislation in the interest of labour, that is to say, the enactment of laws by Legislatures and by Congress, having in view well-defined obligations of employer and employees, such as safety appliances for trains, hours of labour, the payment of wages, the rights of employees to be heard in courts where they have claims to be adjudicated, and numerous others in which partisan politics will play no part, the common good being the animating purpose. Sixth. — In the department of insurance sound business principles will ba introduced, something that has not hitherto engaged the serious attention its importance merits. At present insurance entails grievous burdens without corresponding benefits ; to lessen the cost while maintaining every security and every benefit, will be the problem the department will solve. It is the purpose to have a life as well as an accident department, both to be optional with the membership. With this declaration of its purposes and with boundless faith in its con- quering mission, the American Railway Union consecrates itself to the great cause of industrial emancipation, 155 PART III.— WAR. Chapter I. — A Prophet of the Social Revolution. Some thirty years ago there was a small child, homeless and friendless, earning a pre- carious living as a printer's devil in an office in Bosfton. One day while the boy was busy among the compositors, a strano;e wild man made his appearance and asked for work. There was something aljout the stranger which com- o manded attention, and, in spite of his ragged wretched- ness, inspired some awe. He stood six foot in his boots, and there was something in his face which showed that he was born to command. He was a capable compositor, and the foreman provided him with a case at which he soon settled down, and proved to be one of the best typos in the shop. But although he did his work, and did it well, he never chummed with any of his mates. At night he lodged in the garret. In his eye there was a certain awe-inspiring gloom, and in his carriage a haughty reserve which repelled the confidence of his fellow-workmen. But the little printer's devil was strongly attracted to the silent and distant man. REV. GEO. HEREON, Trof. of Applied Christianiiy, Grinnell, loiva. 156 Chicago To-Day. The attraction was mutual, and at night time, when the office was closed and the stranger had retired to his garret, he would take the boy with him. While the little waif nestled closely in the strong man's arms, the silence of the night was broken, and the quondam tramp poured into the eager ears of his boyish listener stores gathered in many fields both of life and of literature. There, by the aid of a candle, in an ill-furnished room, he taught the boy to read Shakespeare, and afterwards introduced him, strangely enough, to the mysteries of the Gnostic jDhilosophers and inspired in the child a great passion for Greek philosophy. McCleod, for that was the man's name, was' a gentleman and a scholar, and after a few months he was promoted to be foreman of the shop which he had entered as a penniless tramp only a short time before. The foreman did not cease to be friends with the printer's devil, who still continued to sit at the feet of his master and to look up to his teacher as if a new Gamaliel had been sent to open up to him all the treasures and mysteries of litera- ture and philosophy. After a time, however, to the great distress of the boy, McCleod disappeared as mysteriously as he had come, but not until he had inspired the boy with a genuine intellectual enthu- siasm. In after years, when the boy had grown up, he always said he never thought of his teacher without being reminded of Michael Angelo. Why, he did not exactly know, but between the great Italian artist and McCleod there seemed to him to be a close resemblance. He often vainly longed for his friend to return, but he never saw him nor heard from him again. The mystery seemed impenetrable, but one day the veil was strangely rent when he read in the papers of a desperate encounter which had taken A Prophet of iJie Social Revolution. 157 place in Tennessee, at the end of wliicli McCleod had been killed. Then it came out that this mysterious stranger, who had taught him about the Gnostics and the j)hilosophers of ancient days, was none other than the near relative of the famous James Brothers who earned for themselves an almost heroic fame among the desperadoes of America. McCleod, who had been a bandit before he came to Boston, had found the cravino; for the wild life of the hills too strong; for him and had returned to his old ways. He was shot dead in a mountain pass after having held a United States marshal and fifteen deputies at bay for some time. The youth, thus strangely initiated into the wider life by one w^ho was an outlaw and outcast, grew up with an intense sympathy for the disinherited of the world. McCleod, the quondam tramp, the real out- law who died a bandit's death fio-hting; against the officers of the law, had been to him his best friend and truest helper. It is not surprising therefore that the youth should not have forgotten the lesson so early and so vividly impressed upon his mind. When he grew to man's estate, he threw himself with all the energy of a passionate nature into work for the poor and the degraded. He became a Christian evangelist, and his earnest words, accentuated with intense sympathy, were potent to rouse many in his re- vivalist campaigns. After a time he began to see that mere revivalism, although excellent in its way, was hardly adequate for the needs of humanity. The bitter and cruel injustice of circumstance, the cor- rupting and brutalising environment which defaces the divine image in man, and the triumph of insolent injustice in the affairs of men, filled him w^th per- plexity and pain. While never leaving hold of his 158 Chicago To- Day. evangelical faith, he worked gradually and steadily into a larger conception of life, and applied himself energetically to the study of economics. As the result of his studies and of his experience, he became an earnest and impassioned assailant of the existing order of things in America, and he is to-day the man of all other men who may be regarded as the prophet of the social revolution in the United States. / That man, whose training and preparation for his work I have just briefly glanced at, is the Eev. George D. Herron, D.D., who is now Professor of Applied Christianity at Iowa College, Grinnell, and the author of several little books which read like the utterances of the latter-day prophet. When I was in Chicago I went to Grinnell to address the students at the college where my colleague — Dr. Albert Shaw — was educated, and when there I had the pleasure of making Dr. Herron's acquaintance. Grinnell lies at the highest part of the State of Iowa, on the very ridge of the watershed. Grinnell College stands in the midst of the undulating, black, stoneless, olea- ginous soil, the detritus left in the basin of a sea which has long ago dried up. Grinnell is famous for two things. Twelve years ago a cyclone struck the town, and mowed down its houses as a mower levels the grass of the meadow, and the memory of that terrible visitation is still in the memory of the survivors. It is still more notable as being the seat and centre of the forward movement of Western Christianity. Pre- sident Gates, a large-spirited, far-seeing, courageous man, who is the principal of the college, boldly chal- lenged last winter, in the columns of the North Western Advocate, the attitude of the Church on Social questions. His manifesto rang like a trumpet- peal, summoning to the battle the lethargic and in- A Prophet of the Social Revolution. 159 different Cliurclies of the North- West. Many of the best men rallied to his support, and the battle still goes on. In Professor Herron, Dr. Gates found a co- adjutor after his own heart, and the two ])id fair to stamp the impress of their minds very deeply on the coming generation. Dr. Herron is not yet forty, with a physique which seems to be too delicate for the burden of the message with which his soul is laden. Like most of the men who are shaping things in the West, he is psychical, and has a realising con- sciousness of the invisible world, which sustains him not a little in the midst of his vigorous crusade against the forces of iniquity in high places in the Western Republic. When I met him he was just on the eve of starting for the East, in order to carry round the fiery cross of revolt against the sweating system in States which, owing to the lack of any legislation restraining this modern slavery, were profiting by the restrictions placed upon it in more enlightened States. We had a good deal of talk about the outlook in America. I found him weighed down, almost over- whelmed, by the sense of coming woe. What grieved him most was what seemed to him to be the un- christian attitude of the Christian Church. Instead of being instinct with the spirit of the Nazarcne, it was too often the subservient vassal of Antichrist. " In twenty-five years," he said to me in tones of deep conviction, " in twenty -five years America will see an outburst of vengeance and despair which will be far worse than the French Eevolution, unless something can be done to avert it." But he looked in vain on the horizon for the agency which would be able to cope with the task. The Church, which should be the natural daysman or mediator between i6o Chicago To-Day. the opposing forces, was supine, or worse than supine. In too many cases it was bound hand and foot by the ropes of Mammon in the shape of its wealthy members, seat-holders and trustees. But if the Church could not be relied upon — nay, if the Church itself had thrown in its lot with the oppressor — what was to be done ? Dr. Herron frankly said that he did not know ; all that he could see was that it was the bounden duty of all to whom was vouchsafed a view of thino;s as they are, and as they will be if the present forces are allowed to work themselves out, to use every means at their disposal to rouse the consciences and minds of the people to an adequate sense of the great crises of our time. When I left Grinnell President Gates was good enough to give me a copy of Dr. Herron's little book, " The New Eedemption," a call to the Church to reconstruct society according to the gospel of Christ. It is dedicated to Dr. Strong, and it is one of several little books in which the author has endeavoured to deliver the message with which he feels himself to be intrusted. Among these books there is one, " The Message of Jesus to Men of Wealth," while he was just putting through the press his latest work, entitled, "Christian Society." "The New Redemption" con- sists of six chapters, and I do not think that I could do better than give some extracts from the book in which in burning words he expresses the conviction which is growing in the minds of many of the younger men who in America have paid a dis- interested attention to the economic conditions of modern society. The keynote of the book is struck in the first chapter, which is entitled, " The Social Revolution." Dr. Herron takes as the text of his first discourse the A Prophet of the Social Revolution. 1 6 1 familiar passage in the Apocalypse : "I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more." Dr. Herron asserts that he approaches the social problem, not from the standpoint of a political economist, but from that of a Christian apostle. His object was to cross-examine some of the false prin- ciples which have bred social inequalities, and to assert the true principles which can procure social justice. Every few centuries God drops a great idea into the soul of man. It thrives on persecution and throned by crucifixion. It destroys man if he rejects it ; it saves man if he accepts it. The master idea of the world two thousand years ago was Redemption. Now — A great idea is leaclinf^ the world's ihonglit and lifting its hopes. Everywhere are the signs of universal change. The race is in an attitude of expectancy, straitened until its new baptisna is accomplished. Every nerve of society is feeling the first agonies of a great trial that is to try all that dwell upon the earth, and issue in a divine deliverance. We are in the beginnings of a revolution that will strain all existing religious antl political institutions, and test the wisdom and hei'oismof the earth's purest and bravest souls; a revolution that will regenerate society with the judgments of infinite love. We mufct get ready for the chance by making straight the way of the Lord Christ into the heart of the social strife, tliat lie may purify it with the hope of justice ; by giving Him command of the revolution, that He may lead it into a larger redemption of the earth. God honours our generation by bringing upon it the sorrow and trial of seeking a road to social order, of finding a way to something like an equitable distribution of economic goods, a mutualism of the responsibilities and benefits of civilisation. The idea cf brotherhood, co-operation, unity, is both destroying and recreating the world. It will not do to say the revolution is not coming, or pronounce it of the devil. Revolutions, even in their wildest forms, are the impulses of God moving in tides of fire through the life of man. To resist them is to be consumed, and to compel the remission of sins by the shedding of blood. To receive them as from God is to receive the kingdom almost without observation. The dangerous classes in every age and nation are tiiey who, in the interest of i-eliglous or political parties, say that the wrong cannot be set right, that selfishness and injustice and inequality are natural virtues, essential to progress and the stability of civilisation. It is evident from these opening passages that Dr. Herron attaches an entirely new sense to the familiar phrases which have been heard a thousand times in our churches. Although a Christian, he is M 1 62 Chicago To- Day. instinctively a Socialist, and declares war to tlie death against a civilisation based upon competition. To liim competition is only a shade better than cannibalism : — In fact, we are and have been in a state of industrial anarchy — of social lawlessness. Seliishuess is always social disintegration — competition is not law, but anarchy. That competition is the life of industry is the most profane and foolish of social ialsehoods. Cain was the author of the com- petitive theory ; the cross of Jesus stands as its eternal denial ; it is social iiu!)ecility ; it is economic waste; it is the destruction of life; it is the (iLforniity, brutality, and atheism of civilisation ; it will be as outrageous to the civilisation of tlie future as cannibalism is to the civilisation of the present. To him nothing is more absurd than the appeal of the capitalist to law and order. The whole social question, he maintains, is rapidly resolving itself into a question wdiether or not law, as capital, can ])e brought into subjection to law. Our so-called industrial order is the disordering of nature. It is the dis- organisation of human life. The social problem is the call of the state to become Christian. Tlic state can save itself only by believing in the Lord Jesus Christ as the supreme authority in law, politics, and society. The state is tlie social organ. To meet the strain that will be put upon it by the revolution, the state must be redeemed from the worship of property and from commercial theories of government. The Sermon on the Mount is the science of society ; it is a treatise on political economj^ — it is a system of justice. Industrial federation lies in the nature of things. An industrial democracy would be the social actualisation of Ciiristiauity. It is the logic of the yerraon on the Mount, which consists of the natuial laws by which industrial justice and social peace can be obtained and established. Inequality of possession seems to him a kind of original sin, and the search for social justice, even Avhen conducted by atheists, is essentially a belief in the practicability of the principles which are the essence of Christ's Gospel. At present he declares, and quotes authorities for the faith that is in him, that we have attained not social justice, but social injustice : — ■ It is hardly disputed that capital, under our modem industrial system, is receiving more than a just share of the fruits of labour, and the labourer is lecciving relatively less and kss of the profils of his toil. The increase of wealth and wages is in no sense equitable. "Thoughtful men see and admit," says Judge Walter Q. Grcsham, " that our country is becoming less A Prophet of the Social Revohdion. i 53 and less democratic, and more and more plutocratic," and plutocracy he pronounces the most insidious of all forms of tyranny. " Nothing," says Dr. Tlieodore Dwight Woolsey, " would lead tiie mass of men to embrace Socialism sooner than the conviction tbat this enormous accumulation of capital in a few hands was to be not only an evil in fact, if not prevented, but a necessary evil beyond prevention. ... A revolution, slow or rapid, would certainly bring about a new order of things." It is the work of tlie Church to Lriiio- too-ether in a divine unity the various human interests that are now at strife, but he has ahnost as much faith in the capitalists as he has in the Church for the attainment of this desirable end. He says : — It lies within tiie power of the American capitalists who call themselves Christians, by taking the Sermon on tlie Mount and patiently working it into the foundations of industry, to be the creators of a new and divine civilisation that would surpass all our apprehensions of the Revelation of John. Christianity has yet to become Christian, and he says : — • The social revolution, making the closing years of our century and the dawning years of the next the most crucial and formative since the crucifixion of the Son of Man, is the call and opportunity of Christendom to becom j Christian. The whole social problem is a question of how to manifest Christianity as the natural humanity of man ; how to reveal the cross as the universal law of sacrifice by which God made and redeemed the world. Few men have expressed more strongly and in more provocative fashion the modern revolt against million- aires than has Dr. Herron. He says : — The priests who accompanied the pirate ships of the sixteenth century, to say mass and pray for the souls of the dead pirates, for a share of the tpoil, were not a whit more superstitious or guilty of human blood, according to the light of their teaching, than Protestant leaders who flatter the ghastly pliilanthropy of men who have heape^l their colossal fortunes upon the bodies of Iheir brothers. Their fortunes are the proudest temples of the most defiant idolatry that has ever corriipted the woisldp of the living God. Their philan- thropy is the greatest peril that confronts and deceives and endangers the life of the Church, and thinks to bribe the judgments of God and deceive the Holy Ghost. The industrial world is itself the supreme opportunity for modern Christian philanthropy. Tho mighty brother-loving tasks to which the Spirit of God calls the genius and enterprise of our age, are the conversion of manufacture and commerce into tho ministers of divine righteousness — into instruments for the execution of the justice of divine love. Dr. Herron is no pessimist, for he, like other men, has visions of a better future : — As I look anxiously and prayerfully into the future, I see the men who work and the men who own, labour and capital, marshalling themselves upon M 2 1 64 Chicago To-Day. opposite sides of a conflict that may bring woe to all that dwell upon the earth. As the liosts anger and strengthen, 1 see one like unto the Son of Man moving down the gathering lines, to bind all the conditions and interests of hiiman life ia the mutualism of the justice of the kingdom of God I see Him reach to clasp the hands of strife in a federation of love, which is the realisation of the freedom of God in humanity. This federation of love, in his opinion, is incon- sistent with the wages system, a theory which he expresses with an emphasis which leaves nothing to l^e desired. But, like seers in general, he abstains from particularising as to the precise method by which a more practical arrangement is to be discovered and put in its place : — • The buying and selling of labour in the cheapest market is based upon the arrogant and intolerable assumption that man is made for j^roperty, and not property for u an. The wages system is economic slavery ; it is a profane traffic in human flesh and blood. Tiie only safety of capital itself is in the abolition of the so-callpd law of wages, and the federation of money and work in tliC creation of property as a communion with God in the perfection of man in the freedom of Christ. He calls aloud to the Church to put its hand to the plough. If it does so, it will not fail of the support of its Divine Founder. The cause of modern social agitation is not the ownership of property, but the individualism which lias enthroned the mammon of selfishness in the place of the fatherhood rf God as the providence of progress. Tlie immediate business of the Church is to go in and possess the world of work, wagt s, and wealth, and make it divine, in tlie faith that everything is wrongly done that is not done in the name of Jesus Christ. . . . And in the darkest hour of mortal despair, through the fiercest storm of liuman passions, there will come that same Jesus who ttilled the waves of His native sea, to sijeak the com- manding word that shall hush the social strife in tlie peace of perfect justice. The truth of God's human fitlierhood and man's divine sonship, with the l)rotherhood of need and service wh'ch it means, makes all ownership a ministry of God's providence and tiie creation of property a continuation of the redemptive energy of God in Christ. But, he laments, the Church itself fails to recognise its law. What will this generation do with Jesus Ciirist? He is here, and on trial in the social problem. The love of Christ is still the most revolutionary, element that can be introduced into society. It can mean nothing less than entire social reconstruction. Its application to the industrial world, its assertion as social law, may be rejecteJ as destructive of order, and described as dangerous to the peace of the Church and State. The principles that rule the motives and successes of men are the very elements of disorder and dis- integration. What we have been accustomed to call economic laws is the A Prophet of the Social Revolution. 165 lawlessuess of society. There is no law but love. The old foundations upon wliich society stands will have to be removed. Society must be reborn into a kingdom of love, anl the nations oat of the tree of the healin"; Christ-like, th'-it there may be a just and rij^hteous civilisation. Tiie axe of God is being laid at tlie roots ff the tree of strife that has poisoned the earth with its fruit since the days of Cain. Tiie kingdom of heaven is at hand with a new conception of redemption as social and national. The natural operations of the love of Christ as the law of life alone can jirocure the social justice -which is the search of the Spirit of God in the people. There can be no peace to the eartli until the last iutrenchment of organised selfishness, tho last citadel of false civilisation has gone down before the white-robed hosts of the conquering Ciirist. They who cry peace between justice and injustice, between love and selfishness, between truth and hypocrisy, are the prophets of the devil, however sweet their words, and not speakers for God. Will the Church believe in the love of Christ, and will society receive it as law and justice, or shall He be put to a new crucifixion ? It is this question that makes our day historic with the greatest destinies since the day tiiat awoko upon the cross of the Son of man. Not since the Nazarene gathered about Him His Galilean ditciples have^there been such universal moral and political clianges as we now see in their beginnings. The reformation of Luther and Wicklilfe was small in its issues compared to the social re-adjustments and moral revolutions that shall come forth from the supreme crisis towards which history is now moving. The old things are breaking up to pass away, with what confusion and sorrow no one can tell, and a new and divine society is preparing to come in — a society so just, so pure, so loving, as to V>e an eternal incarnation of Christ. The crisis is God's call upon the Church for men who will take tho social ideal of Jesus, and dedicate themselves to its realisation iu theology and science, in government and industry : men who believe. But the crisis offers to the Church salvation or perdition. The work is to be done witli the Church, if the Church will ; if not, then without it. Unless tlie Church repents of its moral sloth and blindness, and accepts its new and greatest mission with the cross it brings, its temples of material splendour will become dust beneath the eager feet of the children of the kingdom. If the Church that accepts Christ's name refuses to bear His cross of social redemption, it will justify the statements that it is not a Ciuistiau institution, and God will regenerate civilisation without the Church. But salvation now, as always, is to Le wrought out by sacrifice. To look the present evil age squarely in the face, and decide to follow Christ through the midst of it, and teach His love as the cure of its evil, and as the law its activities must obey, is to make up one's mind to accept some form of a crucifixion at the hands of those who want not tho reign of Christ or the dominion of His love. They who resolve to make the subjection of the world to the law of love the one thing they do, need to understand from tho first that they bring not peace among men, but a sword. Through great tribulations will the new redemption come, bringing crowns of thorns and crosses for its prophets. The early workers upon the foundation which Jesus 1 66 Chicago To- Day, is laying for a divine society will accomplish the fall of this hideous, colossean materialism -which we call civilisation; but they tliemselves will be crushed iu the fall and buried beneath the ruins. They have a baptism to bo baptised with tliat will straighten them till it is accomplished. The shadow of the cross, under which Jesus wrouglit His love into the hearts of men, hangs heavy upon tlie closing years of our century, and no man can do the work whicli God wants done now without walking a path tliat leads straight to a new Calvar}\ It has never been enough tliat men simply believe rovide for the making of all repairs to such cars by the railway companies using them — as to certain repairs absolutely, and as to all others upon the request of the Pullman Company, which ordinarily finds it most convenient to use its own manufacturing facilities to make such repaus. The other, and a distinct branch of the business of tlie Pullman Company, is the manufacture of sleeping cars for the above-mentioned use of railway companies and the manufacture for sale to railway companies of freight cars and ordinary passenger cars, and of street cars, and this business is almost at a standstill throughout the United States. The business of manufacturing cars for sale gives employment to about 70 per cent, of the shop employees. The manufacture of sleeping cars for use by railway companies under contract, and which, under normal conditions, gives employment to about 15 per cent, of the shop employees, cannot be resumed by the company to an important extent for a very long time, for out of the j^rovision made for the abnormal travel last year the company now has about 400 sleeping cars in store ready for use, but for which there is no need in the existing conditions of public travel. It is now tl reatencd by the American Kailway Union officials th:i,t railway The St J- ike at Pulliuan. 193 companies usiug Pullman sleeping cars shall be compelled 1 1 deprive their passengers of sleci^ing car accommodations unless the Pullman Company will agree to submit to arbitration the question as to whether or not it shall open its manufacturing shops at Pullman and operate them under a scale of wages which would cause a daily loss to it of one-fourth the wages paid. And thus be.o^an the o-reat struo:2:le, the end of which is not yet. Up to this point the strike had been conducted without the slightest disorder. The number of arrests in the town of Pulhnan had indeed gone down, and not a finger had been laid upon the property either of the Pullman Company or of any of the railroads using the Pullman cars. The storm, however, was about to burst. The strike, which began with a miserable difference of opinion as to the paper used on the sides of freight cars, widened out to dimensions so vast as to throw even Mr. Pullman and the Pullman monopoly into the shade. Henceforth w^e hear little of Mr. Pall- man l)eyond the fact that repeated appeals were made to him by the mayor of Chicago, supported by tele- grams from no fewer than fifty other American mayors, urging him to submit the dispute to arbitra- tion. Mr. Pullman, however, remained obdurate to the last. There was nothing to arbitrate about, he said, and he was equally resolute in his refusal to allow a question as to whether or not sufficient basis could be found for arbitration to ])e referred to a committee. No arbitration, no mediation, no recog- nition of trades unions ; Mr. Pullman must be free to do as he pleases to do wicli his own, and that is all that there is to it. Now, dismissing Mr. Pullman and his monopoly, let us turn to a much wider drama to which the Pullman dispute but served as the prologue. 194 Chapter III. — The Achilles' Heel of Civilisation. Mr. Pullman with liis thirty million dollars' worth of capital, his fleet of two thousand sleepers, and his immense interest, is but a pigmy compared with the giant who now advances to the fray. Mr. Bryce long ago pointed out that in America the railroad president comes nearer to possessing the power, the authority, and the prestige of the monarch than any other citizen of the Republic. The railroad is king in America to an extent almost inconceivable to older countries. The reason for this is that in America the railroad is a necessity of life. Without the rail- road there are large communities which would simply die of starvation, and unless the railroads run regu- larly hundreds of thousands of American citizens would simply perish. The American railroad system is indeed a Goliath of Gatli. The railway system of the United States is in the hands of 7 1 2 independent operating companies, but, as a matter of fact, 80 of the larger concerns control over 80 per cent, of the gross receipts, leaving only 18 per cent, to be divided among the 632 smaller companies, which for practical purposes may be dis- missed from account. These railway companies have constructed 170,000 miles of rail, and they have a standing army in their employ of over 800,000 men. There is no such orp'anisation in the New World as that which is directed by the presidents and managers The Achillei Heel of Civilisation. 195 of the railway companies. The total capital repre- sented by the liabilities of the railways exceeds two thousand million sterling, which in 1892 paid a dividend of practically over three per cent. In no branch of American life has competition been carried more recklessly to its utmost extreme. Now and again some experienced railway manager ventured to point out that it might be expedient to give the legis- lature some control over future railroad construction, but such modest suggestions are usually met with a howl of derision, it being regarded as the settled policy in the United States that railroads should be built by anybody anywhere under any conditions, no matter what the result might be, because the more competi- tion among the railroads the better for the general public. The result can hardly l^e said to have justified the confidence with which this doctrine of unlimited competition was promulgated among the citizens. The cost of transportation is cheaper per passenger and per ton per mile than in any other country in the world ; but, notwithstanding this, somehow or another the railroads have come to be regarded, especially in the west, as enemies rather than benefactors. The average opinion of the average man resident in America would probably be, if taken at random, for the most part socialistic, so far at least as the rail- ways are concerned. They hate the railways. They regard them as tyrannical, unjust, partial, and gener- ally the enemies of the human race. This may be due to ignorance and prejudice, but there is no doubt as to the widespread detestation with which the railroads are regarded by the people among whom they earn their dividends. The whole of the inter-state com- merce legislation bears eloquent testimony to the conviction of the majority of the American citizens 2 196 Chicago To- Day. tliat tlie puljlic is victimised by the gigantic organ- isation, and that, in order to secure something like ordinary justice, the government needs to be armed with very extensive powers to supervise their rates and generally to maintain justice between the big and little customers. Under the system of unregulated competition the big monopolies play into each other's hands, with the result that the little man goes to the wall at a constantly accelerating ratio. Hence the great animosity on the part of the little man towards the economic agent which gives him the coup de grace. Chicago, the greatest railway centre in the world, is naturally very much under the influence of western ideas on this subject. From Chicago as the centre radiate some 80,000 miles of rail, and Illinois has the largest railway mileage of any State in the Union. According to the statistics published on June 30th, 1893, there are no fewer than 70,000 men employed on the railways of the State ; of these a large numl)er live in and al^out Chicago. Illinois has a total mileage of 15,051, of which 10,315 miles are main track, 1,300 miles additional track, and 3,436 miles yard track and siding, a total increase of 373 miles over the preceding year. The state has 18 "4 miles of road per 100 square miles of territory, and 36 miles of road per 10,000 inhabitants. Eighty-five per cent, of all lands in the state are within five miles of railroad; 11 "5 per cent, between five and ten miles ; 2 J per cent, between ten and fifteen miles, and 1 per cent, between fifteen and twenty miles. The total capital stock of railroads in the state is $930,557,461 ; funded debt, $1,111,749,725; current liabilities, $91,658,407; total railway capital, $2,133,965,593. The capital stock per mile is $22,435 ; funded The Achilles Heel of Civilisation. 197 debt per mile, $26,804, and current liabilities per mile, $2,209 ; total, $51,448. Between the railway companies and their work- men there is no love lost, even less than what there is between the railways and their customers. The mere destruction of human life is enough to explain much of this bitter feeling. Every day in the rail- ways of the United States, seven employees are killed and 11 injured. The annual destruction of passengers does not average more than one per day killed and five injured. One only needs to look at Chicago on the map to understand how vitally important are all railway c|uestions to its citizens. This great city, with a million and a half of popula- tion, is stretched over a gridiron of rails which cross and re-cross the city, and form a complex network of tracks, every mesh of which is stained with human blood. It is not for nothino- that the dismal bell of the locomotive rings incessantly as it tears its way into the heart of Chicaoro throuo-h the streets. In O O England the locomotives use the whistle, not the bell, and this solemn weird tolling of the bell is very impressing to the imagination of the visitor who hears it for the first time sounding every hour, year in, year out, summer and winter. As regularly as the sun rises these great engines slay their man in and upon the streets of Chicago. No other great city in the world has allowed its streets to be taken possession of to a similar extent, and the massacre resulting therefrom is greater than that of many battles. We in England have always one or more little wars upon our hands on our frontiers where they impinge upon the lawless tribes in Africa and Asia, but I do not think that it is too much to say that in the last five years we have had fewer soldiers 1 98 Chicago To- Day. killed in our wars all round the world than have been slaughtered in the streets of Chicago at the grade crossing. The figures are : in 1889, 257 ; 1890, 294 ; 1891, 323 ; 1892, 394 ; 1893, 431. As might be ex- pected, the number of these railroad murders steadily increases with the growth of the population.* In the city of Chicago there are under 2500 miles of roadway, but there are 1375 miles of railroad track within the same area. The railroads traverse the streets at grade in 2000 places. Under Mayor Washburn e a commission was appointed to investigate the matter, and an effort was made to ascertain the obstruction to traffic caused by this system. Mr. E. S. Dreyer, speaking at the Sunset Club, where the subject was discussed on February 1, said : — ■ Our terminal commission caused to be taken, by careful enumerators, a count at thirty-six of our most dangerous crossings on a certain business day, from the hour of six in the morning to seven in the evening, and their report showed that there passed during that time over the thirty-six crossings G8,375 vehicles, 9145 street cars, 221,942 street car passengers, and 119,181 pedes- trians. The gates at these crossings were lowered 3031 times, and the total time the gates were closed on the thirty-six crossings was over twelve hours, delaying 15,000 vehicles, 2320 street cars with 51,367 passengers, and 18,212 pedestrians.! These figures, be it noted, have only regard to thirty-six of the 3000 crossings in the city. For years past the city has protested, but protested in vain. The railroads ride roughshod over the conveni- ence, the rights, and the lives of the citizens. Sisera with his 900 chariots of iron never tyrannised more ruthlessly over the Hebrews than the railroads with * In the State of Illinois the record of accidents for the year ending June 30, 1893, shows that 802 persons were killed, 23 being passengers; 246 employees and 533 others. There were 3,751 persons injured ; 2,664 were employees, 399 passengers and 688 others. The increase in the total number killed was 82, or 11-4 per cent. ; and the increase in the total number injured was 1,311, or 53-73 per cent, over the year before. t In justice to the railways, however, it should be stated that many of the grade crossings came to Chicago long after the railroads did. The streets were laid across the railroads long after the railroads themselves existed. The Achilles' Heel of Civilisation, 199 tlieir fire chariots of steel have lorded it over the city of Chicago. Every week in Chicago you read of grade crossing accidents, and it is very seldom that you hear of any- thing being done to saddle any one with the respon- sibility for the loss of life. The evidence before the jury is usually to the following effect : The gates were not lowered, the watchman was not in attend- ance, no whistle was sounded, no bell was rung. The deceased was crossing the track all unwitting of any danger, when a train dashed up with the inevitable result. In many cases the bodies are mutilated out ot all human semblance. The nightmare imagination of those gruesome artists who exult in describing the torture and mutilation of helpless victims could depict nothing more terrible than the human sacrifices which are ofiered up daily on the altar of the Railway Moloch by the city of Chicago. Very rarely is any one saddled with the responsibility. The railroads have taken the precaution of protecting themselves l3y law. By an infamous act, boodled through the Illinois Legislature l)y railroad infiuence, no jury is allowed to award more than $5000 damages against the rail- roads for causing the death of any citizen. The usurpation of the streets of the city is none the less a usurpation because it was achieved by gold and not by steel. In many cases railroads have laid their tracks throug;h the streets without even 2:oin2: throuoh the formality of asking for a franchise. They have treated Chicago as a conquered territory. The stroll- ing Tartar, who in the Middle Ages wandered abso- lute lord over Russia, was the prototype of the rail- road corporations in the capital of the West. For the use of the streets the railroads have not paid a cent into the City Treasury. Whatever payment they 200 Chicago To-Day. made was made corruptly, and went into tlie pockets of the aldermen, and sometimes of the Mayor. If they paid $100 a mile for way-leave that would bring in the city a revenue of nearly |200,000. So far from doing any such thing, the railroads have im- posed upon the city an expenditure which is estimated at $30,000 in the salaries of twenty -five policemen and other employees, paid by the city for the purpose of raising and lowering the gates and of warning citi- zens to escape slaughter. Further, they have put the city to the expense of millions in the building cf viaducts over their tracks where the expenditure cf life became too great even for Chicago to tolerate. In 1892 the cost of maintaining? these viaducts was no less than $146,000. For the privilege, therefore, of keeping the annual total of human sacrifices down to a victim a day the city pays blood-money amount- ing to $176,000 a year. But, it may lie urged, the city has in its own hands the power of taxation, and it can recoup itself from the enormously valuable property within its limits. Here again we are confronted with another specimen of the way in which the citizen goes to the wall. Mr. Washburne, when Mayor of Chicago, stated publicly that the value of railway property in the city was not less than $350,000,000. It is to-day assessed at less than $19,000,000. All this explains if it does not justify the popular sympathy with which Mr. Debs and the American Railway Union entered upon their war with the railways. The war with the railways is a very different thing from a war with Pullman. To attack Pullman was something equivalent to a declaration of war against let VIS say Belgium, but the moment the war is The Achilles' Heel of Civilisation. 201 carried across tlie French frontier and the French Kepublic enters the fiekl, Belgium counts for nothing. So it was with the American strike. When the boy- cott was decided upon the battle-fiekl was changed. It became a fight between the strongest organised representatives of both capital and labour in the United States. So far as organisation is concerned, the railroad compared to the railway union is as Goliath was to David. But Debs was as confident in his ability to bring the Philistine to earth as was David when he fitted a smooth stone from the brook into his sling. Mr. Debs miscalculated on this vital point. Talk- ing to a newspaper representative immediately after the die had been cast, he said : — In Chicago it is safe to say that the Illinois Central, the Monon and the Chicago and Eastern Illinois will discontinue the nse of Pullman sleepers as soon as the order is given. This last road will lose the Nashville limited train and all its southern connections. In the east Indianapolis, Detroit, Cincinnati, Toledo, and Cleveland can be relied upon to allow no Pullman cars to pass through. St. Louis, Kansas City, Milwaukee, and New Orleans are solid. So are Minneapolis, St. Paul, Denver, Omaha, Council Blufts, Salt Lake City, and Ogden. On the Pacific slope not a single wheel can be turned if it belongs to a Pullman car. San Francisco, Sacramento, Los Angeles, San Bernardina, Portland, Tacoma, and every division terminal is thoroughly organised and ready for business. At noon, June 26th, the boycott was declared : — " It is war between the General Managers' Association and the American Kailway Union," President Debs said yesterday of the boycott against the Pull- man Palace Car Company, which goes into effect at noon to-day. "We welcome the struggle and will win, because we are right." " I am glad the matter has become a sharply defined issue," was tlie com- ment of George M. Pullman, i:)resident of the great corporation whose interests are attacked. " The American people will learn whether thousands of millions of dollars of invested capital can be arbitrarily put aside and rendered valueless because a labour organisation has a grievance against a manufacturing concern which also owns cars used in the railway service." Mr. Debs' first expectation that some of the rail- ways would discontinue the use of the Pullman cars was not justified by the event. The railroads, whether they used the Pullman or the Wagner cars, decided to stand together as one man against the l3oycott. 202 Chicago To~Day. At a fully represented meeting of tlie General Managers' Association, the following resolutions were unanimously adopted : — Whereas, We learn through the public press that the American Kail way Union will declare a boycott on all Pullman palace cars, and Whereas, Said boycott is in relation to matters over which we have no control, and in wliich we have no interest whatever, and Whekeas, It is stated tliat the object and intent of the said boycott is to riLLMAN CARS. discommode the travelling public and embarrass the raih'oads, in tlie belief that tlie public and railroads affected will influence the settlement of the question as the American Eailway Union desires, and Whereas, It is necessary that these companies determine for themselves what cars they shall or shall not liandle, and Whereas, It is important that tlie travelling public should understand tbe Ijosition of the raih'oads in this matter ; therefore be it Besolved. 1. That it is the sense of this meeting that the said proposed boycott, being confessedly not in the interest of any employees of said rail- road companies or on account of any grievance between said railroad companies and said employees, is unjustifiable and unwarranted. TJie Achilles Heel of Civilisation. 203 2. That the employees of the said railroad companies cannot, nor can any of them with propriety embarras said companies or discommode the travelling public because of their sympathy with the supposed wrongs of employees engaged in a wholly different class of labour. 3. That we hereby declare it to be the lawful right and duty of the said company to protest against said proposed boycott ; to resist the same in the interest of their existing contract and for the benefit of the travelling public, and that we will act unitedly to that end. Every railway system in Chicago was represented at the meeting which adopted the foregoing reso- lutions without a dissenting vote, not only the general managers hut presidents, vice-presidents, and other general officers attested the importance of the occasion by their presence. Thus we see that the moment the boycott was declared all the railway lines, with two inconsiderable exceptions, united into an association which accepted the gauge of battle and prepared for fighting it out to the bitter end with all the energy and vigour which characterises the railway management of the United States. The railroads had another immense advantasre over o Mr. Debs. Not only were they stronger financially and in possession of far greater administrative capacity than any union could hope to command, but the state of the labour market was entirely in favour of the employers against the employed. There are 800,000 railway employees in the United States. Mr. Debs did not claim to have more than 100,000 or 125,000 in his union. That is to say, there were seven men outside his union for one who was inside. Not only so, but there were more men out of work who had some knowledge of train ser- vice than all those who owed allegiance to Mr. Debs. It was calculated last year* that one-fifth of the rail- * During 1893 nearly 13 per cent, of the entire railway mileage of the United States, representing over 12 per cent, of the entire capitalisation, has gone into the hands of receivers. During the -two years 1892 and 1893 the companies for which receivers were appointed represent over 19 per cent, of 204 Chicago To- Day. way mileage of the country passed into the hands of receivers, that there had been a decrease in a twelve- month on the lines leading out of Chicago alone of no fewer than 60,000 employees, and in the country altogether 160,000 were out of work. It therefore seemed a forlorn hope that a union of 125,000 men could hope to defeat the raihvay companies which had a reserve of 150,000 unemployed ' men to draw upon, especially as there was no dispute about wages between the employers and their men. The boycott that was ordered was a boycott of sympathy, and as such did not appeal so closely to the out-of-work non-unionist as the strike for wages or hours would have done. So far, therefore, as could be seen at the beginning of the strike, everything was in favour of the railroads excepting one thing. The railroads, like Achilles, have their vulnerable heel, and it was a heel which is so vulnerable as to constitute the railways themselves the Achilles' heel of society. The railroad is almost as delicate a mechanism as a watch. A single sleeper displaced, one little bridge blown up, a signal box paralysed, a telegraph wire cut, can throw the whole the mileage aud nearly 16 per cent, of the capital stock and bonds of all the railways in tlie country. Between January 1 and December 31 seventy-one railroads have gone into the hands of receivers. These roads represent a mileage of 22,534 ; funded debt, $753,917,000 ; capital stock, $534,035,000, and a total of bonds and capital stock of $1,287,952,000. In this last sum only outstanding bonds are counted, bonds authorised but not issued not being included. Evidence of the unprofitableness of railway investments is shown in the fact that in eighteen years 549 roads, aggregating over 57,000 miles (one- third the present mileage), have been sold for debt, involving in loss bonds and stock aggregating $3,170,000,000. If the end of this career of disaster had been reached, there might now bo hope of better results, says the Tiailway Age, but a host of railways are still awaiting the orders of the courts for sale, and the procession of insolvents has increased with amazing rapidity in the last few years; so that it is a jjainful certainty that the record of foreclosures in the coming years will bo even greater than that of an equal period in the past. 7'he AcJiillcs Heel of Civilisation, l!05 Organisation into confusion. Every day in tlie year the railroads of America carry on an average a million and a half passengers and two million tons of freight. This vast moving mass is hauled across vast expanses of country which are practically uninhabited. They pass also through villages and cities fenced off by no partition wall from the inhaljitants. The railway tracks constitute 170,000 miles of spider web, the thread of which could be broken by a single sturdy tramp with a crowbar. It is this which constitutes the vulnerability of the railway. A recent writer in the North American Review called attention to a very remarkable fact bearing upon this point. He says : — There is a standing order on the Central Pacific Railroad forbidding con- ductors of freight trains to jjut off tramps. Why ? Simjjly because there arc hundreds of miles of wooden snowsheds on the roads, and wlien the tramps arc put off tliey set those on hre. It is cheajier to carry them on the trains. Here we have the frank recognition of the inaljility of the railways to protect themselves against lawless marauders. A railway company which practically undertakes to carry tramps free because every strolling vagabond with a lucifer can with impunity block the line is not exactly the ironclad organisation with which to fight a revolt. The comparative impotence of the railways was brought out very clearly by Coxeyism, and again by the later phases of the miners' strike. By the simple process of sitting down on the railway track the strikers and Coxeyites were al)le to arrest the progress of a train, for, although the Americans are notoriously indifferent to human life, an engine-driver who deliberately drove his train over an unarmed man would be shot on sight. But for this liability to interruption the railways would be invulnerable tyrants. As it is their tyranny 2o6 Chicago To- Day. is tempered by a fear of violence which would dislocate the whole of [their system. It was this weakness of theirs which, in the opinion of some observers, lay at the 1>ottom of the victory of the American Railway Union on the Great Northern Eailway. It was the first great victory which organised labour had won over the railroads, and, as such, it deserves more attention than it has received. In the opinion of a competent observer on the spot in Chicago, the Great Northern capitulated not in the least because of its regard for justice or because of its abilities to hold its own in a fair strike against the railway unions. Why then did the Great Northern give in ? The answer is given in the following paragraph : — The Great Northern line runs for the most part through a wild and thinly settled country. The task of guarding its tracks against evil-disposed persons is practically an impossible one. From the beginning of the strike it was evident that trains could not be run without danger of violence either from the strikers or their sympathisers, and it was plain that practically the whole population along the line of the road favoured the men. Under these circumstances President Hill had to decide between tying up his road for an indefinite length of time or surrendering to the strikers. He chose the latter alternative and the American Railway Union scored a triumph. That is to say, the American Railway Union won its greatest victory by the fear that the refusal of its demand would lead to the destruction of the property of the company. The union repudiates this indig- nantly. On the eve of the boycott Debs declared that his union would see to it that no violence what- ever disgraced the strike, and referred to the Great The Achilles Heel of Civilisation. 207 Northern strike as a proof that he meant what he said : — No violence of any kind would bo attempted, and no destraction of property -would follow the side-tracking of palace cars. During tlic cigliteen days of tlie strike on the Great Northern, as we were assured upon its termination by President James J. Hill himself, said Mr. Debs, not live cents' wortli of goods, equipment, or stock, had suffered damage by reason of our men's actions. Everywhere they guarded the Company's property against depre- dations, and that will be the case here. After the boycott had been dechired he telegraphed to the local union which had shown a disposition to interfere with the traffic by force as follows : — • You are, under no circumstances, to interfere with trains or with any men sent to handle them. You are to stay away from the railway companies' property, and trespass in no way upon their premises. Anyone violating this order will be expelled from the American Kailway Union, and be prose- cuted by the organisation itself to the full extent of the law. Nevertheless, the astute and experienced men who were defendino- the railroads from the attack of the union did not indulge in any delusion as to what Debs might do as a peacemaker and as a restraining influence. They were in for a strike which was likely to be protracted, and they knew perfectly well that such a strike would not be fought out without an appeal to arms. Their first step was to engage the ablest man whom they could discover in the whole range of their organisation as general-in-chief. This gentleman was found in St. Paul, and he was promptly placed in command. Mr. Egan's reputation was that of being a tireless fighter, and the moment he arrived in Chicago from St. Paul he took in hand the organi- sation of the campaign with all the resolution of an experienced veteran. Mr. Egan began his career in connection with the Canadian Pacific, but he had had local experience on the Chicago, St. Paul, and Kansas City Road. The executive committee of the Railway Association acted as a consultative council, but the 2o8 Chicago To-Day. whole direction of tlie strike was placed, in his hands. The railway kings do not admit reporters to their conclave, and it is not known what sum was guaranteed for providing the sinews of war. But as it was recognised as a matter of life and death, corporations representing hundreds of millions of pounds were not likely to let their manager fall short of the necessary funds. The moment Mr. Egan took command he made no secret of the plan on which he would proceed. He would fio-lit the strike and beat it. The elements in his favour were four : first, the superior organisation of the railroads ; secondly, the number of unem- ployed men wanting work ; thirdly, the possibility of invoking the intervention of the Federal troops in order to secure the passage of the mails and to prevent any interference witli the working of lines which were in the hands of receivers ; and fourthly, he had the general resource of every citizen threatened with loss l^y violence, the right to demand the presence of police, deputy marshal, and the militia, to prevent any attack upon life or property. With Mr Egan's explanation of his plan of cam- paign I will end this chapter, and proceed to notice some of the leading actors who are now about to appear upon the scene : — " We do not intend to be drawn into any controversy between Mr. Pullman and Ms men. The Eailway Union insists that we shall not run any trains if we haul Pullman cars. For the purpose of boycotting Mr. Pullman they have ordered certain strikes. We intend to fill the places of these strikers at once and resume business. " We ignore Mr. Pullman in this struggle. We have not sent a committee to see him, and do not intend to. There was a disposition at first among all the managers to wait a few days and give old employees a chance to go back to their places. If they don't do it, new men will be brought in. We have already opened recruiting stations in a number of cities, where employees are engaged. We guarantee to protect them from violence, and will do it. The advance brigade of imported men are due to arrive in the morning. They will be landed in the Baltimore and Ohio, the Pennsylvania and the Illinois The Achillei Heel of Civilisatio7i. 209 Central yards, and they will be protected at their work, too. These men shall not be interfered with in any way. The police will protect them, aided by our other employees. " The authority of the United States will be invoked in a number of cases. On any lines in the hands of receivers, such as the Santa Fe', the Wisconsin Central, the Minneapolis and St. Louis, the Northern Pacific, the Union Pacific, the Erie, and others, we shall rely on United States authorities to protect our men, and we shall not hesitate to call for federal assistance should it be needed. Where we send police or our own guards to protect labourers, we will endeavour to so place them that the fewest number can protect the greatest number of workmen, such as in union yards. Wo are now fully equipped for this great struggle," Mr. Egau concluded, " and shall push it to a finisli. Employees under.stnnd that they are still at liberty to return to their old places. Those who desire to do so may yet return, but those who stay out must understand that new men are coming to take their places and will hold them." And with this declaration the great fight may Ije said to have begun. 2IO PART IV.~DEFEAT. Chapter I. — The Keepers of Law and Order. The duty of maintaining law and order in America falls primarily upon the sheriff when the disturbance is confined within the State, and raises no questions' entitling the Federal Government to interfere. If the sherifi" finds that the forces of disorder are too many for him, or if he should refuse to act, then the statute proceeds to say that either the mayor or the coroner, or the county judge, can advise the governor of the position of affairs and ask for assistance. The governor then communicates with the sheriff and inquires from him how it is that the citizens are not receiving the protection to which they are entitled under the law. Should the sheriff, as frequently happens, declare that the moli was too strong for him, the suggestion is made that he should swear in deputy marshals, or what we should call special constables, to enable him to enforce the law. Any sheriff can enroll as many deputies as he thinks necessary, and when they are enrolled they can be armed ■ and used as officers of the law, just as special constables with us. If, however, no deputies are forthcoming, or if the maximum available force of deputies is insufficient to overcome the forces of disorder, nothing remains but to appeal to the governor for arms and for troops. These troops are not regulars, but the state militia, a force which is regarded as military principally oi^ The Keepers of Lazu and Order. 211 account of its possession of arms and of uniforms, and the very occasional practice of military drill. The State of Illinois, which is about as large as England, has a total of about four thousand armed men under the command of the governor. Two regiments of this army are stationed at Chicago, where they have been called upon more than once to repress disorders occasioned by industrial dis- putes. They were called out in 1875, when there were some riots in connection with the Relief and Aid Society. In 1877 they were called out to deal with the railway riots, and twice dispersed the mol3 at the point of the bayonet without firing a shot. In 1886 they were again called out to repress riots occasioned by a strike in the stock yards, and during the recent miners' strike they were repeatedly on duty ; but their presence was sufficient to estab- lish at least an appearance of order. It will be seen from this that the pivot of authority in the American States is first the sheriff and then the governor. Upon the sheriff of the county and the governor of the State lies the whole responsil)ility for maintaining law and order within the limits of the State. The situation is changed when circumstances arise o which justify the intervention of the Federal Govern- ment. That intervention is only justified when disorder exists which affects interests in which the Federal authorities have a rio;ht to be heard. In the present strike the intervention of the Federal power was only possible when the strikers interfered with the free transit of the mails, or with the administra- tion of the railroads which were in the hands of receivers, and therefore in a sense wards of the court, or if they interrupted inter-state commerce. In any ^ne of these three cases the Federal could, and as a ' p 2 212 Chicago To-Day. matter of fact did, interfere, but the due procedure had first to be gone through. The district attorney must apply to tlie United States Judge declaring that the local authorities are unable to keep order, and that in consequence the free transmission of the mails or inter-state commerce, or any other Federal in- terest, is in danger. The United States Judge for the district, which, in the case of Illinois, includes Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, is empowered to grant to the district attorney a general injunction prohiljit- ing all interference with mail trains, or of trains crossing state boundaries. Having done this, the judge at any moment can call in Federal troops to uphold the injunction or enforce the law. The difficulty of course in the case of a very wide- spread strike is that the Americans have hardly any troops available. The standing army of the United States is divided into eight military departments, which have less than 5000 soldiers apiece. The entire American army according to the army list consists of twenty-five regiments of infantry, ten of cavalry and five of artillery. The officers in command of the military department are Ijound to obey the orders of the United States Judge. The officer in command of the department of Missouri, which includes the States of Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, Illinois, Kansas and Arkansas equally with the Indian and Oclahama territories, is General Miles, an officer of standing and reputation, who would no doubt be capable of handling a very much larger body of men than the tiny hand- ful that he could concentrate upon Chicago. Surveying the scene of the outbreak of war, we find that the authorities had at their disposition a force of men amounting altogether to some 8000 men. Of these, 3000 form "the police force of The Keepers of Law and Order. 2i, Chicago, who are under the orders of Mayor Hopkins and Chief of Police Brennan. The State Militia, which could only be called out by Governor Altgeld, do not number more than 4000 men, and General Miles could not get together more than 1500 or 2000 re- gulars in case cir- cumstances arose which would jastify Federal interference. Of course, behind these armed and more or less disci- plined men lay the vast reserve of citi- zens capable of being armed and enrolled as deputies or special constables. A Chi- cago Encyclopaedia, published at the time of the Fair, said that there were about 50,000 able- bodied men trained in the use of arms l)y the secret societies of the city. Governor Altgeld in the course of the strike declared that he could if need be enroll 50,000 citizens to enforce the law. In dealing with a popular strike the difHculty always arises as to how far you can depend upon your deputies and upon your militia. In this struggle it was proved that in California there w^ere no more hearty favourers of the strikers than the militiamen. They even went so far as to manifest their sympathy by wearing the GENERAL MILES' GOOD INTENTIONS FOU THE NEW TEAK. 214 Chicago To-Day. colours of the strikers, and still more substantially by distributing cartridges to tlie very men whom tliey were called upon to keep in order. More reliance can Ije placed on tlie Federal troops, both because of their better discipline, and because they are less likely to be under the influence of local feeling. In former days, before Homestead made the name of Pinkertons to stink in the nostrils of civilisa- tion, the natural resource of the threatened railways would have been to have enlisted their own police, or Pinkertons as they were called, 1)ut since Home- stead this resource has been generally scouted, and indeed is forbidden l)y law in many of the states. The authority of the law can also be invoked against the strikers if they are guilty of conspiracy, or of any of the offences which can be constructively alleofed against those avIio are at tlie head of o o a popular movement of this kind. It is notable, however, that the railroads distinctly refused to prosecute Debs, or the other leaders. They maintained that the battle must be fought between labour and capital to the end, and that any recourse to the courts would be rather against the interests of capital than otherwise. It would enable Debs, said Mr. Egan, to pose as a martyred man. So the prosecution of Mr. Debs was not undertaken by Mr. Egan and the rail- oads, but by the officers of the Federal Government. But in any state in the American Union, which is confronted by the prospect of what may be called incipient civil war, the first and most important question is what kind of man have they elected for Governor, Now in Illinois they have a very remarkable man as Governor, a man whom it is the fashion to denounce and to deride, but who is in reality an administrator of considerable originality The Keepers of Law and Order 15 and of PTeat force of character. Joliii P. Altofckl, although of German origin, as his name implies, is as typical an American^ — and a western American — as I have ever met. He is not a tall man, l)nt there ME. JAMES SCOTT, EDITOR OF THE "CHICAGO HERALD.' was something about his face and appearance which irresistibly reminded me of Abraham Lincoln. I met him at the Auditorium Hotel immediately after breakfasting with Sam Fielden, one of the Anarchists 2r6 Chicago To-Day. whom he had pardoned. Governor Altgeld was elected by the Democrats in 1892 against the protest of the Chicago Herald^ the leading Democratic paper, which is owned and to some extent influenced by Mr. John R. Walsh, wdio is President of the First Chicao;o Bank and head of the Western Union News Company, the W. H. Smith of the Mississippi Valley. The objection taken by the Herald was that Altgeld was a Socialist by creed and by profession, that he had written Socialist books, and that he could not be depended upon to enforce the law against law-breakers. His sympathies were declared to be with the Anarchists, and it was a slight concession to the fears of the more conservative Democrats that at the State Convention in which he was nominated, a plank was introduced into the platform of the party, stating that they demanded " protection of the life and property of American citizens at home as well as abroad." Mr. Altgeld had also written in opposition to capital punishment, and, as the Govenor of the State, it was his duty to see that the hangman did his work. He has now been two years in office, and at the last democratic State Convention which nominated Mr. Franklin McVeagh for the senatorship, a special refer- ence was made to Governor Altgeld's administration. The manifesto declares that the Democrats of the State of Illinois " heartily commend the fearless integrity and sturdy determination which has characterised the administration of Governor Altgeld, in which great reforms have been achieved in all branches of the public service of the state, civil and military." So far as I could form an opinion during my stay in Chicaoo, both from the brief interview which I had with him and from the voluminous comments which his administration elicited from both parties, I The Keepers of Laiv and Order. 217 should say that he had a great reserve of moral strength, considerable originality of judgment, and a very healthy disregard for the fretful fussiness of the newspapers. He is a man of strong opinions who is not afraid to express them. One of his oftences in the eyes of many good people is that he is not much of a professor of religion, a fact which leads the un- charitable to denounce him as a socialistic infidel. Talking about this matter with him, he remarked dryly, that he had " not enough religion to hurt." Judging from some of his acts, it would seem that he has at least enoug;h religion of a more or less in- articulate kind to help him to stand to his guns when he thinks that a clear issue of right and wrong is involved. The most characteristic act of his administration was the pardoning of the three Anarchists who had been imprisoned since the Haymarket outrage for complicity in the crime. Opinion ran very high upon the subject, but if Governor Altgeld had con- fined himself to exercising his clemency and re- leasing the three men as an act of grace little would have been said. This, however, did not accord with his conception with what was right and just, so he made his message pardoning these men an elaborate vindication of their innocence, and a very pronounced attack upon the judge who condemned them. This judge was none other than the redoubtable Judge Gary, an Irishman, who in personal appearance re- minded me of a miniature edition of our present Lord Chief Justice. Judge Gary is a conscientious man without interest in or knowledge of the world as it boils and bubl^les around him. As he told me himself, his function was to sit apart from the multitude applying abstract principles to concrete 2i8 Chicago To- Day. cases wliicli were brought liefore him in the courts. Governor Altgeld may have been right or wrong, but there is no doubt but that he excited much sympathy with Judge Gary by the somewhat unprecedented course which he took in criticising the justice of the sentence which he was annulling, and Judge Gary last November was re-elected by the votes of both Eepublicans and Democrats over all other opponents. Of more importance, however, as indicating the line which would probably be taken by the Governor in relation to the railway strike, was the course which he had previously taken in dealing with the disorders which followed in the wake of the miners' strike. The Governor was almost badgered to death by telegrams from all parts of the State requesting arms and troo2)s. In one case at least where he had first refused to send troops, and finally had been compelled to do so by the violent representations of the sheriff", he had the satisfaction of learning that when the troops arrived there was nothing for them to do, and that the sheriff" himself had to shamefacedly ask for them to lie withdrawn. Governor Altgeld, although not a Populist, l)elongs to a stratum of thought which is very Populist in its tendency, and he may be counted with the other Governors, such as Governor Lewelling, of Kansas, who was at one time domiciled as a tramp in a Chicago police station, Governor Hogg, of Texas, and Governor Waite, of Colorado. All these Governors are more or less socialistic, as we should say, or, as they would say, more or less in antagonism to the exploitation of the community by the robber barons of the mines and of the railroads. Hence when Governor Altgeld was compelled to call out the State troops for the repression of disorder in the mining districts, he The Keepers of Law and Order. 219 made it clearly to be understood that lie had no intention whatever that they should be used in the interests of the employers. He caused to be read to the troops whom he had sent to La Salle the following intimation, which was a tolerably plain indication of the way in which his sympathies lay : It is not the business of soldiers to act as custodians or guards over private proi^erty. The law authorises them simply to assist the civil authorities in preserving the peace, quelling riots, and executing the laws. Wherever troops have been or may hereafter be ordered, and when an owner of property feels it necessary to have it guarded, he must do so at his own expense, and in such a case the troops can bo used only for the purpose of promptly quell- ing a disturbance of the peace, or suppressing a riot, or in some other way enforcing the law. Contrast it for instance with the declaration of Governor Matthews of Indiana which was issued about the same time : — "Those mrn must cease their unlawful acts. If necessary every miner in Sullivan County will be arrested. The troops will remain there until tJiere is evidence of peace. It will be difficult to wear out the state. It has gone into the contest to remain until it is over. The strikers will become tired of furnishing bail or go to jail. If the sheriff and others will not perform their duties I will proclaim martial law." This, however, was not the only occasion on whicli Governor Altgeld indicated that he had very little patience wdth those who were clamouring for the help of the soldiers against the strikers. Sherifi' Dowell, of Marion County, appealed to the Governor for troops. Mr. Altgeld told the Sherift' very jDlainly that he had flinched from his duty, and was endeavouring to throw the responsibility of the preservation of peace upon the soldiers. " I have ordered," continued the Governor, " the troops to Carterville in order that peace may be preserved and the law executed, but I will suggest to you that, if you have not the courage or capacity to properly discharge the duties pertaining to the office of sheriff, then you resign at once and let somebody take your place who can and will do it, for under the law troops 2 20 Chicago To- Day, cannot be kept long at a place where tlie sheriff can, liy proper effort, preserve order and execute the law." To this letter the Sheriff, not a whit daunted, replied as follows : — " Notwithstanding your insulting telegram, you seem to have a studied mctliod of learning nothing of strikes in Illinois, no matter how dangerous, and have little desire or capacity to control or assist in controlling them. " I find it to be the opinion of many here, that the strike throughout the State ■would have been easily controlled, and the whole State at peace, without bloodshed, if you had resigned as governor, or had gotten sick and left the State in tlie hands of the lieutenant governor, who sympathises with and loves law and order. I am frank to say that I have at heart only the good of this county and its citizens, and, if resignations are in order, I stand ready to resign when you do. I am willing to make any sacrifice needed to benefit the citizens of Illinois." It can lie imagined then that when Governor Altgeld was confronted with the strike in Chicago, that considerable anxiety was felt by the defenders of law and order as to how far the Governor could be relied upon to use the forces at his disposal to keep the strikers from interfering with traffic. I now come to the other great personality connected with the maintaining of order at the seat of war, namely Mr. Hopkins, the Mayor of Chicago. The fact that the man wdio, the other day, w^as working as a lumber shover or a day labourer, should now be autocrat of the capital of the New World, is a distinct contribution to the romance of coiitem porary history. The Arabian Nights element is always the most interesting in the history of nations and individuals, and there is a oreat deal of the Arabian Nights element in the rapid rise of Mayor Hopkins. John Patrick Hopkins was born in Buffalo. He was educated in the common school, and was the third son of a family of twelve. His father and his brothers are dead, and wdien quite a boy his sisters had to take to dressmaking in order to keep the family in The Keepers of Law and Order. 221 bread and butter. As soon as lie left school, which he did at a comparatively early age, he set to work to earn his living. His first place he found for himself. He started in life by heating rivets in an iron foundry. From there he went to work in the Evans elevators, and by the time he was twenty had established a good enough reputation for regularity and industry to l)c appointed weighmaster of the place. When he was twenty-one he came to C-hicago, the city which f(jur- teen years later was to elect him to the highest office in its gift. For four months he looked around. He fixed up his sisters in dressmaking business, and then started out to look for work for himself. He was not quite twenty-two when he went down to Pullman and asked the superintendent of the works for a job. In reply to the question of what he could do, he replied that he would do anything. Being asked if he meant what he said, he was taken at his word. The super- intendent was rather pleased at his determination to try his hand at whatever turned up, and sent him to shove lumljer down in the yards. There he worked as an ordinary labourer for some months until he had satisfied the management that he had good stuff in him which could be better employed elsewhere. What- ever may Ije said concerning the autocracy which Mr. Pullman has established in the city which bears his name, no one can deny that the autocrat and his agents have a keen eye for capacity, at least up to a certain point. Mr. Hopkins' career illustrates this. In August, 1880, he was called into the storekeeping department. The April next year he was appointed timekeeper in the store ; in the following August he became general timekeeper. Two years later he was made paymaster Ijy Mr. Pullman. But notwithstanding his rapid promotion and the 2 22 Chicago To-Day. responsible position which he occupied as paymaster of the great industrial army which recognises Mr. Pullman as its captain-general, Mr. Hopkins was singularly independent. It used to be said of him in those days that he was the only man in Pullman who dared to call his soul his own. He was a Democrat, although Mr. Pullman was a Republican. He was young, a comparative stranger, without capital or re- sources of his own ; but not content with his position of salaried employe, he went into business on his own account in the Arcade. A friend of his who knew him at Pullman, and to whom I applied for some information of those early days and of the struggles by which Hopkins established his reputation, wrote me as follows : — "This Arcade is one of the original and peculiar institutions of the little manufacturing city of Pullman, which is now, much against Mr. Pullman's will, part of the great metropolis of Chicago. It is a big, red structure with jjassage-ways running north and south and east and west throughout, and on either side booths and shops. In the upper stories there is a small theatre, a public library, offices and flats. In one corner of the main floor is the Pullman Savings Bank, through which the pay-roll runs and which is ready to care for the deposits of the working-men. There is no other place in the settlement where shops other than groceries and markets can be kept, and those are for the most part centred in one great market building, modelled after the same plan. It is possible for the company to dictate in these matters, as it controls every inch of the ground, and not even the streets have been dedicated as public highways. It has its own iiotel, which has always lost money for the company, but which is sustained for tiio convenience and gratification of the officials, and especially Mr. Pullman. Even the church is the property of the company. The Catholics w^ere indeed after a long time permitted to build on consecrated ground, but before they were given a deed it is said that a priest who had espoused the labouring men's side in a great strike had been compelled to resign. However that may be, it is sure that the reverend father without any apparent reason did fold his tent and desert his flock against their pro- tests and despite their tears, leaving another to finish the church which he had begun. "This was before I came to Pullman, and I speak therefore only by hearsay. But John Hopkins had beeu the companion of the reverend father in guilt, and his resignation had been demanded as a punishment for the crime of opeidy sympathising with the working men. It was forthcoming without a murmur, and after a little time spent in silence and without either suing for restoration or complaining, the young man was invited to return, and his demand for a largely increased salary was granted. It was Pullman's first surrender. But the fact was that it was not easy for any one to fill young The Keepers of Law and Order. 223 Hopkins' place ; he knew Ole Olson in the brickyard and Ole Olson in tho foundry, and he never forgot either or mistook one for the other. So much of his work was in this way personal that the conveniences for a merely mechanical system of paying were not at hand, and his successor made a sad botch of it. Besides, the absence of swagger or bitterness on the young man's part was a strong recommendation for a new trial; but, state it as you will, it was a great victory for the mayor-to-be, tlien little more than twenty-five years old. A similar victory was afterwards scored by a young man named Harper, who served as chief accountant, and was discharged for insubordina- tion, and requested to return after a time to straighten out a set of books which some of the best experts in Chicago had failed to decipher. He was really a wonderful accountant, whose equal I have never known ; and what because of this, and what because of a fellow-feeling for him. Mayor Hopkins has chosen him to unravel the muddle of the City Hall, a task which ho seems to be performing with perspicuous ability and great despatch. But though Mr. Pullman restored both of these gentlemen to their positions witljout requiring an apology and with increased salaries, he did not fail to place persons with them to learn the work so as to supplant them, and each found a short shift for himself as soon as the powers felt able to dispense with his services. Perhaps this may have been apparent to John Hopkins all along, and may have had much to do with his inditference. " Politics was the cause of war. If there was anything which Mr. Pullman could not endure, it was stiff-necked rebellion politically. Like so many American manufacturers, he had come to think protection a necessity to his business, support of it loyalty to his interest and that of his employe's, and voting the wrong way in some manner a treachery unpardonable. But the imperturbable paymaster merely smiled in his usual confident and provoking way, and proceeded to do his best to carry Pullman for the Demo- cratic ticket. "It was not an easy thing to do. The people were accustomed to sub- serviency, and yet more so since the unsuccessful strike referred to in the foregoing. But Hopkins was indefatigable, and he knew Ole Olson in tlie brick-yards and Ole Olson at the foundry — in short he knew them nil. To be sure, they worked for the Pullman Company. Doubtless largely because of their admiration for the brave fellow who had stood unabashed and victorious before the company, they did give a considerable Democratic majority in spite of the ever-increasing rumours of oSicial vengeance. Keally, by his words, his magnetic presence, and, yet more, by his example, Hopkins brought manhood and courage to the surface in men who had never given any signs of either before, and have since lapsed into the old, lack-lustre, subservient mode of life. "This was too much, and the brilliant young paymaster had to get out without ceremony ; and (whether as a fearful warning or not I cannot say) fourteen hundred others, to a man Democratic voters, were sent out too. The reason assigned was lack of work. As a Republican victory had been scored in the nation, this could hardly be ascribed to their fnture votes. But to an outsider it seemed as if the company by one fell blow thought to make such things impossible for the future. Not only was the leader but the Hock as well, this time, driven out of the gates. As before, there was not a word of complaint from the imperturbed young paymaster, who only entered a formal protest when the rent was suddenly and greatly increased on the store-rooms occupied by himself and partner in the Arcade. Amid the sneers of the company and its satellites, he prepared to remove his business to Kensington, and for that purpose pushed, with tnie Chicago enterprise, the construction pf a new store building." 2 24 Chicago To- Day. He established himself in " Bumtown," on the out- skirts of Pullman, which had been abandoned to saloon-keepers and disreputable houses. His advent changed everything. His store was a wonderful suc- cess. His waggons delivered goods in Pullman, for the autocracy of the company could not Ije stretched so far as to prevent its late paymaster from using the public thoroughfare. Mr. Hopkins is still in litigation with the company to recover the exorbitant rent exacted from him. He has also had more than one oj^portunity since l)ecoming mayor of making it even with his adversaries. Not that there is any trace of bitterness in him ; no one could be more smiling, affable or debonair. But he has not lost a chance since he arrived of reminding the public of the seamy sidelof the Pullman administration, whether in gas or in water, or of the district containing 100,000 population on the boundaries of Pullman which has not yet been provided with a common sewer, owing to opposition of the owners of real estate in the neighbourhood. Mr. Hopkins was always a politician, but he was twenty-seven years old before he was appointed to an office. The position which he held was that of treasurer to the village of Hyde Park. Two years later he endeavoured to* obtain the nomination to the National Democratic Convention. As usual with young aspirants, he had to fight his way to recogni- tion. He was defeated in 1888, but he made so plucky a fight against Mr. Green that his standing in the party was recognised without further hesitancy. He was placed on the committee, and in the Presi- dential campaign Pullman was delivered over to his hands by the Democrats. It was Mr. Hopkins who first startled the Republican close borough by torch- light parade through the streets, and by this and The Keepers of Law and Oi^der. 225 other electoral sensations he achieved a victory which startled every one. The next year he followed it up by a municipal success quite as notable, for as Chair- man of the Annexation Committee he played a lead- ing part in adding 225,000 population to Chicago. Among the towns annexed, Hyde Park was one of the most important, and the Pullman Company had the chagrin to see their estates annexed to the city of Chicago against their opposition. After this he became President of the Cook County Democracy. He took the boys down first to Springfield and then to Washington. His name was first coupled with the mayoralty in February, 1890, when, with a thousand members of County Democracy Marching Club, he went down to Des Moines to attend Governor Boies' inauguration. Hoj)kins, who has an extraordinary memory for names, resembling therein the Queen and Mr. Gladstone, who are said never to forget a name they have once heard, presented each member of his thousand marching Democrats, and it is said that he never made a mistake in the name of a single in- dividual. All this time he was building up a big business. He entered upon other work, dealing with street cleaning and street work, and he had become a very substantial citizen. All his mind was concen- trated on business and politics. He took no part in society, although he belonged to several clubs. He spent most of his time in his store or at home with his mother and sisters. He dressed well and kept in well with the influential people, including President Cleveland, who last year appointed him receiver of the Chemical Bank, the duties of which responsible post he discharged with the vigour and despatch which characterise all his actions. 2 26 Chicago To-Day. When Carter Harrison was shot and the election was ordered to l^e held for the appointment of his successor, there was no intention on the part of the official gang in the County Democracy to run Hopkins. They would willingly have nominated one of them- selves, but Mr. Hopkins came in and said he wished the nomination, and all opposition went down before him. He does not owe anything to the party managers, unless it may be a few grudges, which he will probably pay off in due time. He refused ab- solutely to make any pledges or to bind himself to any course, but insisted on having his hands free in case he were elected. With many a wry face his rivals bowed to the inevitable, and Mr. Hopkins entered for the campaign against Acting-Mayor Swift. It was hot and furious while it lasted, but so far as Mr. Hopkins was concerned the contest was not characterised by any asperity, nor did he commit himself recklessly in his election pledges. In the end he was elected by a majority of over 1200. No sooner was the Mayor in the saddle than he began a campaign which bore the strongest re- semblance to that of Mayor Pingree in Detroit. He addressed himself to the elevation of the grade crossino-s, ordered a list of the killed and wounded to be made up and read to the Council at their meetings. He prepared himself for a battle royal with the boodle element in the Council, which he saw would endeavour to use the attempt to elevate the tracks as a means of levying blackmail on the railways in order to em- barrass him in his enterjDrise. Finding the city hope- lessly behind in its finances, he cut his own salary ten per cent, and insisted on a general reduction all round. He surrounded himself with competent and public- spirited advisers, and began a systematic inquiry The Keepers of Law and Order. 227 into all the abuses which have disgraced the city. Comptroller Ackerman drew up a report upon the scandalous system of assessments, which is the disgrace of Chicago, and the report was published to the dismay of all the tax-dodgers of the community. He took energetic measures against the street railways to compel them to fulfil their obligations in repairing the tracks, in paying the license-duty, and in dis- charging the other obligations which they owed to the city. His first battle with the Council took place over the North-western Elevated Eailway Ordinance, which the aldermen had passed, it is said, in return for 1000 dollars a vote, for making an elevated railway to the north-west. The Mayor vetoed the ordinance be- cause it did not secure any return to the city in the shape of a percentage upon the gross receipts. His veto was sustained. The ordinance as amended pro- vides that the city shall share in the gross profits of the railway. A committee was appointed to inquire into the unauthorised encroachments on the public domain by steam railways, with results which are not a little surprising to the public and disagreeable to the railroads. He stopped the disgraceful system of levying fees for inspection. He waged war against the system of collecting and retaining the taxes by which collectors were able to pocket scores of thou- sands of dollars which ought to belong to the public, and generally set on foot an investigation of the shady places of the city administration. By a ukase he peremptorily suppressed the raids for revenue upon houses of ill-fame, which have been the scandal and disgrace of Chicago for many years, and ruined at least for a time the business of the professional bailer and the justice of the peace. In dealing with Q 2 2 28 Chicago To-Day . the police his avowed policy has been to remove the police from politics, but the temptation to avenge himself on his adversaries was too strong to enable him to carry out that programme in its entirety. Captain Ship|)y disappeared, Captain Mahoney was reduced, and Inspector Eoss compelled to resign. There was no attempt to justify these acts other than upon political grounds. Mr. Hopkins' great fight, however, was waged with the boodle gas ordinance. For a whole week the victory was in dispute, nor did any one know to which side it would incline. At the Council meeting Mayor Hopkins launched one of the strongest messages which has ever been addressed to such a body. His veto was sustained, although forty-two members of the Council voted in its favour, while only twenty- two voted against it. He was saved from defeat by the defection of a certain number of Republican aldermen. The Democratic boodlers stood firm, with the result that the Mayor's next task is the ridding of the City Council of the presence of the corrupt memljers of his own party. Personally Mr. Hopkins impressed me very favour- ably, partly, I must admit, at first on account of his resemblance to Cecil Rhodes, the Prime Minister of South Africa. C-ecil Rhodes is the ablest man in the British Empire from the administrative point of view, and if Mayor Hopkins is anything like Cecil Rhodes, he will not stop far short of the presidential chair. He is, however, younger than Mr. Rhodes, and of a more nervous temperament. When he presides over a Council meeting, his fingers are continually playing with his mallet, and at times even this method of disposing of his surplus energies fails, and he gets up and walks backwards and forwards like a caged lion The Keepers of Law and Order. 229 on the raised dais on which the mayoral chair is pLaced. He may get over this when he grows ohler, otherwise it will wear him down, for the aldermen are a tough crowd, and he has a very long row to hoe before he gets to the end of his job in Chicago. He is a demon for work, and his constitution, which has not been impaired by any excess either in drink or tobacco or other forms of dissipation, will stand a much greater strain than would ruin the strength of most of his opponents. There is a joyous elan about him which will stand him in good stead. He had not been elected three months before he established a reputation in Chicago which no other man possesses, and it was admitted reluctantly, even by those who are opposed to him, that if he were to stand on an independent ticket he would be elected Mayor at present by a majority of three to one. " He has a spine like a telegraph pole," exclaimed a banker, admiringly, after reading the message on the boodle ordinance. It would be difficult to describe more picturesquely the kind of backbone which is needed by a man in Mayor Hopkins' position. Mr. Hopkins is not an orator, but if he were to take a little more trouble he would be able to excel as much on the platform as he does in administration. There is a honliomie about him which is attractive to the masses, and he is quite Bismarckian in the reckless candour with which he expresses his opinions. He is not a scholar nor a student of books. He reads the newspaper, and he lives in the midst of his fellow- men. Mayor Hopkins has continued to set an example of industrious administration, and he had so far succeeded in maintaining his hold, at least upon his own party, that he triumphed over all opposition 2.^0 Chicago To-Day. in securing the nomination of Franklin McVeagh for the Senatorship. He has added to his laurels by the stand which he took against the opening of a race-track when the whole forces of the ME. HAKRY KUBENS, Corporation Counsel of Chicago. betting fraternity were arrayed against him. He has, however, not improved his record in the matter of the suppression of the gaming-houses. Considering that gaming-houses are running wide open all over The Keepers of Law and Order. 231 Chicago, it is surprising to learn that when he was examined before the Grand Jury the mayor of the city was able to declare that he had no personal knowledge of the existence of any such institutions in the city under his jurisdiction. He has also excited against him considerable opposition owing to the vetoing of the Sunday Closing Ordnance, a law passed by the majority of the Council compelling shops to close on Sunday, not in the interests of Sabbatarianism, but in the interests of one day's rest in seven, which over three-fourths of Chicago is at present denied to the shop employees. In this, however, I suspect that we may see the hand of Mr. Rubens, his able legal adviser, who may possil)ly have a race bias against Sunday Closing. Mr. Hopkins, as an old employee of Pullman, was natur- ally intensely interested in the dispute, but so far he seems to have succeeded in preserving the impartiality expected of his position for his appeal to Mr. Pullman to consent to arbitration could hardly be regarded as a divergence from the line of strict neutrality. The only expression of opinion made by him in the course of the strike which I have been able to come across was a remark that he considered the struggle might easily be fatal to Pullman, no matter how the strike resulted for the men. The indignation excited by Mr. Pullman's obstinate refusal to consent to arbitra- tion in any shape or form would work to the detri- ment of his cars all over the union. That, however, was a by-issue. The question was no longer one between Pullman and his men, but between organised capital represented by the railroads and organised labour as represented by Debs' organisation ; and while the two combatants were fighting, the Governor and the Mayor had to keep the ring. 2^.2 Chapter II. — How the Conp^lict was Fought out. The story of the campaign which opened when the boycott was declared on June 26 has been told from day to day in telegrams in the newspapers. It is, therefore, unnecessary to dwell at length upon the details, but it will be more to the purpose to describe briefly the course of events. The boycott ordered for June 26 somewhat hung fire. On some of the lines the men came out ; on others they did not. On the first day of the strike comparatively few of the lines ceased working. The switchmen by leaving at midnight tied up the Central Illinois from Chicago to New Orleans. The desertion of his post by a single gateman blocked nine trains on the Central Illinois and six on Fort Wayne at Grand Crossing for three hours. The gate was not opened until 100 policemen were brought up to overawe the mob. Even then the road was blocked for another half-hour by a striker who threw himself on the line before an advancino; enmne and brouo;ht it to a sudden stop. On the first day of the boycott, trains running Wagner palace cars were allowed to pass freely. This was, however, but for a day. The Companies using the Wagners made common cause with the Pullman Companies, and the strikers after this made no distinction. Every railroad in the Association of Railway Managers, whether it ran Wagners or Pullmans, was attacked. By How the Conflict was Foitgkt out. 233 the 2 8 til two-tliirds of the lines leading to Chicago Avere blocked. On the 1st of July, of the twenty- two companies afiected, ten stopped all attempts to run goods trains, while seven ran no trains at all. Some idea of the extent to which the strike paralysed traffic may be inferred from the fact that usually one hundred and fifty-tw^o passenger trains come into and go out of the Dearborn station daily, but only twelve came in on June 30 and ten went out. That was the effect of the strike on the Western Indiana tracks. In the freight service of these lines only nine trains were moved. Traffic was interfered with on two- thirds of the railroads of the United States. The suburban traffic in Chicago was aliandoned. Goods traffic was minimized, and every effort concentrated upon keeping up the through passenger trains. It is impossible not to feel a certain respect for the intrepidity and resolution with which Mr. Egan and the railroad staff set themselves to break the boycott. They did not conceal from themselves the fact that they were in for a fight and a severe one ; but they prepared for it without fuss, and in the fashion of men who have been in similar crises, and who had come off victorious. They had the trump card of the unemployed up their sleeve, and they bided their time. They began by padlocking and chaining the Pull- man cars to their trains so elaborately that it took experienced trainmen with hammers and cold chisels half-an-hour to unloose them. They declared that they would run Pullmans on every train, and they kept their word. AVlien their switchmen struck, they recruited blacklegs to fill their places, sending them to work under police protection. They had the pick of as many men as they wanted, for starving 234 Chicago 1 0-Day. men swarm in the States, and no Unionism could deter them from earning their bread. The strikers on their part seized and held most of the strategic centres or great railway junctions in a dozen States. They were strongest on the Pacific ^^^■^^^ .^----^5)^1'I!!/' MR. EVERETTE ST. JOHN, General Manager of the Chicago, lioch Island, and Pacific Railway. Slope and weakest in the Eastern States. At Chicago they never succeeded in entirely stopping all traffic, l)ut they shut down the great stock-yards, and prevented the conveyance of the droves of cattle which constantly stream to the butchering establish- ments in Chicago. Mr. Debs and the officials of the Hozv the Conflict ivas Fought 021 1. 235 American Eailway Union sent out energetic manifes- toes denouncing all violence, but it soon became evident to the rough untutored perception of the mob that Labour would be beaten hollow unless Capital could be terrorised into submission. The boycott had not been four days in progress before the strikers began to supplement moral suasion by violence. It was not until June 9th that any serious outrage was committed ; but when once the ice was broken, intimidation became the order of the day. On the Rock Island Railw^ay, at Blue Island, a points- man on strike was arrested for having opened the points so that the best locomotive on the line rolled off the track down an embankment ten feet deep. It lay on its side in the ditch, a helpless discomfited monster, carrying' with it one of the Pullman cars, in which were fortu lately only three passengers, none of whom was injured ; the other cars were thrown promiscuously across the line, effectually stopping all traffic* The previous day at Hammond, Indiana, a crowd of strikers and sympathisers stopped every train by main force, cut off the Pullman cars and blocked the line. One of the trains carried 1000 passengers, who were naturally furious, but to no purpose. Elsewhere it became the rule rather than the exception to resort to violence. Here are a few * The strikers stoutly deny that the engine No. 930 was derailed by any thing but an accident due to the bad construction of the locomotive. The Mediation Committee of the American Eailway Union reported as follows as to the probable cause of the accident : — We find from engineers of the road and from the son of Engineer Edgorle, who was killed by this engine last May, that she has a sprung axle, is out of line, carries a longer driving-rod on one side than the other, binds the rail on the right side and is out of square. This has always been her condition since she was manufactured, and mukes her liable to jump the track at any time. We have examined the switch where the accident took place and find that the switch point has not been brolsen, and that the engine left the track leighteen inches before the switch was reached, conclusive proof that the switch had not boon tampered with. We find also that this engine has jumped the track three times. On the other hand, the Eailroad Company as stoutly deny that the engine No. 930 was of such faulty construction as is liere alleged. 236 Chicago To-Day. items from the seat of war. On June 30tli, before the boycott was a week old, — Suburban engine No. 248, from Blue Island to Burnside, was badly stoned at Kensington by a mob of some 300 persons collected at that point. Trains 17 and 23 were stopped at the Chicago and Eastern Illinois crossing on account of towermen going out. The levers were finally handled and the trains proceeded. A mob of strikers went to Homewood with engine 221, pulled the fire, dis- connected engine 210, and returned north with engine 221, derailing it near Kensington, and leaving it blocking north-bound main track No. 4. Engine 221 was seized by strikers and run between Chicago and Eastern Illinois crossing and Homewood, fur the purpose of carrying strikers to disable all engines found between those points, and when this work had been accomplished, engine 221 was derailed and left foul of the main track without protestation, exposing other trains to danger of colliding with it. Strikers took possession of the interlocking tower at Seventy-first Street and Seipp Avenue, removing the combination board and destroying it, and otherwise interfering and breaking the interlocking apparatus of the tower, making it necessary to close the derails and spike the switches for the main track on the South Chicago branch. It is difficult to give in detail the general conduct of strikers on the com- pany's premises last night. All employees in any capacity who remained at work were threatened with personal violence unless they at once discon- tinued work. The railroads began to recruit special detectives. The train that left by the Illinois Central for New Orleans, on June 29, carried a carload of detectives, armed with Winchester rifles, to secure its safety. When, however, the railroads attempted to bring special detectives into Chicago there was a commotion. A riot was imminent at ten o'clock this morning, when Illinois Central train No. 23 came in, bearing Assistant-Adjutant-General Bayle, of the State guard, a body of forty-five special detectives and the Chicago Zouaves, the latter en route to Little Eock, Ark. Each detective was armed with a policeman's club, a revolver, and a Wincliester rifle. As soon as their pre- sence on the train became known, the crowd set up a cry of indignation, and when the detectives stepped out of the coach they were attacked by the strikers, and three of them were beaten and disarmed. The others remained in the car all day by advice of the railroad officials, and all attempts to get food to them were frustrated by the strikers. At six o'clock in the afternoon they gladly consented to leave the city, and went on the only train sent out on the Illinois Central. All day long an enormous crowd surged about the car taunting the detectives, who wisely refrained from speech. Several strikers uncoupled the car in which they were seated, and one of their number who rushed out to interfere was quickly covered by four pistols and a double- barrel shotrgun. There was, however, no flinching on the part of How the Conflict was Fought out. 237 tlie railroad company. The Monon Company, whose trains were stopped at Hammond, vowed vengeance. Their representative declared — " We shall punish every man possible. The whole course of the mob at Hammond lias been a series of vicious outrages. Were these crimes con- doned, society would suft'er. We shall fight these men to the bitter end, if it takes all the Winchesters and Gatling guns in the State or country. The law is slow, but it will triumph in the end." Twelve hundred deputies were sworn in. The State troops were called out, and despatched to break the blockade at the various junctions. The Federal Government, meanwhile, was looking sharply after the safety of the lines which were in the hands of the receivers appointed by the United States Court, and was preparing to employ the Federal troops in en- forcing the free passage of the mails. There was, however, no disposition on the part of the strikers to abandon the struggle into which the armed forces of the State and of the Federal Govern- ment were preparing to take a part. In Colorado a small force of fifty deputy-marshals was disarmed l:)y the crowd, and on July 2nd a mob of two thousand strikers seized and disarmed two hundred and fifty deputy-marshals who had been despatched to Blue Island to protect the cars. The struggle, although brief, was fierce. When the train, crowded with armed reiDresentatives of the law, steamed dow^n the line, the strikers and their sympathizers blocked the line by standing on the rails, two thousand strong. As the engine slowed up to avoid making a wholesale massacre of the crowd, the strikers saluted it with a volley of stones. On board the cars the deputies drew their revolvers and stood ready to fire at word of command. When the enoine came to a standstill, knives were brandished, and amid 238 Chicago T 0-Day. volleys of oatlis and stones the mob made a desperate and ultimately successful attempt to capture tlie train. The deputies beat them off with the butt end of their revolvers, but ultimately they were over- powered. One of their number was stabbed, but not seriously ; no shots were fired, and the train remained in the strikers' hands. It may be added, as a comical illustration of popular sympathy with the strikers, as well as of the fetish-like regard which Americans show to legal forms, that in the midst of this struggle a village police officer tried to arrest the engineer of the blocked train for violating the town ordinance forbidding trains to block crossings for more than five minutes ! Of him the deputy-marshals made short work by throwing the too zealous legalist from the footplate. Nothing daunted, a second police officer tried the same thing ; but in his case the deputies arrested him on a charge of attempting to interfere with the United States mails. The immediate result of this high-handed defiance of the law was to bring the troops into the field. Governor Altgeld ordered a regiment of State militia to Blue Island, and the Federal troops at Fort Sheridan were got ready to march at a moment's notice whenever the order came from the Federal Judges, who had already served injunctions upon Mr. Debs and the strikers, an indispensable legal preliminary which cleared the way for the interven- tion of the Federal troops. The boycott had not lasted a week, Init it was evidently gravitating into civil war. Mr. Debs still, like the luckless Falkland, kept " ingeminating peace " and denouncing Adolence ; but the rank and file paid no heed to their leader. They saw that the strike was utterly hopeless unless the rail- How the Confiict was Fought 07ct. 239 roads could be terrorised into surrender, and they proceeded to terrorise tliem accordingly. They struck, and struck hard, at the heel of the great Achilles by blocking the lines in all directions. The official programme of the strike was that all traffic was to be brought to a standstill by the peaceful, lawful refusal of railway servants to operate the trains. The actual programme was to prevent the passage of the trains by main force. This was carried out in a variety of ways. Sometimes the strikers simply laid down or set up a child on a chair in front of the advancing train. At other times they tore up the rails, or loosened the ties, or threw a wrecked car across the line. Here and there they greased the rails so that the wheels would not bite, slipped sand into the grease boxes of the locomotive, joulled out the coupling pins, cut the tube of the air brake, and generally put a spoke into the wheel wherever and whenever they found an opportunity. When they found Pullman cars attached to the train they stopped it, hewed off the Pullmans, and trotted them into sidings. At Eiverdale they varied the programme by consuming all the viands in the dining-car and drinking all the wine. It was a s|)ecies of highway robbery according to the latest improve- ments, carried out in the name of oppressed humanity under the aegis, although of course not with the sanction, of the American Railway Union. When all other means failed, the strikers showered stones upon the train, adjusted the switches so as to throw them ofi' the track, and in fact did everything, short of actually building barricades across the per- manent way, that they could imagine, in order to embarrass their enemies. All this was, of course, in direct violation of law, and so far as it interfered with 240 Chicago T 0-Day. the free passage of tlie United States mails, an offence which came little short of treason to the Common- wealth. It was obvious that this could not last. Something must be done, and that promptly. The necessity for action was not merely political, it was also economic. The blockade of the railways was threatening to reduce Chicago to a state of pri- vation like to that of besieged Paris. We have, as a rule, but little conception of the immensity of the work that is involved in the mere victualling of a great city. When the boycott was declared, the rail- ways on the south side alone had received for delivery in Chicago no less than 30,000 tons of ice. In the course of a week they had only been able to deliver 500 tons of this immense consig-nment. The re- o mainder was dripping away under a midsummer sun. The price of ice in the city went up from 126'. to 405. a ton, and a veritable ice famine was threatened. The strike occurred in the midst of the fine harvest. Every day in ordinary times Chicago consumes 60 car-loads of Calif ornian fruit. When the l)oycott was declared not another car-load was de- livered. The fruit rotted on the cars. In Illinois the tomatoes were ripening and the blackberries were ripe. Ripe fruit perishes fast, and the fruit-growers found with dismay that their crops were of no value owing to the impossibility of getting them to the market. Union County in Illinois estimated the losses of its fruit and vegetable growers at no less than £6,000 a day while the strike lasted. The supplies of fish from the Gulf of Mexico were cut ofi', so were the consignments of shell fish from the eastern coast. Ice and fruit and fish, though perishable, are not absolutely indispensable. The city had bread enough in its granaries, but it was in imminent peril of How the Conjlict was Fought out. 54 1 running short of beef and coal. Chicago is the greatest butcher's-shop on the planet. In ordinary times a procession of 6,000 cattle wend their way with unvarying punctuality to the slaughtering houses, where they are despatched with almost automatic precision, and converted into dressed beef with amazing celerity. The railroads have always thou- sands of cattle to transit ; when the lines were blocked the Rock Island had 20,000 animals on its hands, the THE UNION STOCK-YARDS, CHICAGO. North-Western 8,000, and the Burlington 6,000. All these had to be taken out of the trucks and pastured on the nearest farms. Often the unfortu- nate animals suffered tortures of hunger and thirst before any relief could be obtained. The Union stockyards were practically closed, and the cessation of the leading industry of the city sent 6,000 butchers and packers to join the ranks of the unemployed. Chicago has great breweries of its own, but it imports five car-loads of foreign beer per day ; that was cut R 242 Chicago To-Day . off, and the local breweries, deprived of ice and of coal, 1)egan to contemplate with aw^e the prospect of compulsory teetotalism. But it seemed doubtful whether even water could be procured. The whole of Lake Michigan, it is true, lies at the doorsteps, but the water on the lake side is polluted with sewage, and undrinkable All the drinking-water is pumped from in-takes miles from the shore, and as the supply of coal at the pumping- stations began to run short, men wondered how life could be supported in July without water. In Chicago the average daily consumption of coal is 3,500 tons of hard, and 50,000 tons of soft. When the strike broke out there was hardly a ton of soft coal left in Chicaofo after the first week. Factories were closed down for want of coal, nor was there any prospect of fresh supplies being forthcoming until the strike was over. Everywhere there was the same story of privation and discomfort. The cable cars threatened to cease running owing to the exhaustion of the oil which they used for fuel. Chicago, in short, w^as experiencing in a time of profound peace something of the miseries of a leaguered town in time of war. The inconvenience to citizens, so far as their own locomotion was concerned, was almost inconceivable. At the besinninsf of the strike the suburban traffic was discontinued. As Chicago lives in its suburbs, more even than London, some idea can be formed -as to what that involves. One incidental advantage re- sulted in the shape of an immense increase of cycling of all kinds, which will probably be one of the few permanent benefits left by the strike. The passenger traffic was least interfered with, but many trains were blocked. Trains full of w^omen and children were sometimes blocked for days, and in one case, at How the Conjiict was FoiLght out. 243 least, a whole hundred of suffering passengers were compelled to lie blistering in the midsummer sun, with scanty food and no water. The strikers refused to allow their miserable hostages this necessary of life for thirty hours at a stretch. This was the condition of things in Chicago on July 2. All freight trains were practically stopped. The suburban traffic was very irregular. The passen- ger traffic was blocked on several lines. The city was suffering acute inconvenience for want of ice, food and coal. Scores of thousands were thrown out of work owing to the dead calm of industry. At certain points, notably at Hammond, in Indiana, in Blue Island, in Riverdale, at Grand Crossing, the strikers had resorted openly to actual violence and outrage. Mr. Egan, surveying the scene from the headquarters staff of the railroads, declared : " The situation is becoming critical, and in a few hours we shall be in the midst of a reign of physical violence. The emotion is growing rapidly worse and the end cannot be foreseen." The strikers were jubilant. The reign of terror seemed as if it were about to bear the fruits of victory. But the very extent of their terrorism brought about the reaction, which, finding expression in the appear- ance of Federal and State troops, ultimately killed the strike. The end, however, was not to come for another fortnight, and in the course of that time much was to happen. It must not be forgotten that the strike was from the first absolutely hopeless as a strike. The only chance of success lay in the possibility of enforcing the objects of the strike by the methods of civil war. To begin with, the American Railway Union, a mushroom thing of yesterday, never included as R 2 244 Chicago To-Day. many members as the number of train-men actually out of work owing to the depression and the conse- quent reductions of staff. For 125,000 men out of 820,000 to expect to tie up all the railways when there were 160,000 trained men out of work ready to take their places was absurd. As a matter of fact, the whole of the 125,000 men never went out on strike. The strike was confined to the States of Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Kansas, Colorado, California, New Mexico, Arkansas, Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, Wyoming, Washington and Utah — fifteen out of forty-four States and territories, and in many of these it was very partial. The railroads, even if they had no reserve of unemployed to draw from, could have drafted all the men they needed from their staft" in the States where the strike never penetrated. This might have been prevented by two means : either by creating a sufficiently strong sense of esprit de corps among the men that they would voluntarily refuse to assist against the strike ; or by striking terror into the Ijreasts of the blacklegs, so as to deter them by sheer dread of murder or mutilation from taking the vacant places of the men on strike. Both were tried and neither succeeded. The American Eailway Union was from the first confronted by the opposition of two powerful and older Unions. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Fire- men both opposed the strike and refused to take any part in it. Nor did they stand alone in this respect. Public opinion, even the public opinion of the workmen in the trade specially concerned, was not unanimous. Terrorism alone remained. But terrorism, even when using dynamite, is ineftective against the constant pressure of absolute hunger. How the Conflict was Fought oat. 245 Tlie strike failed because for every single man wlio struck there were two who were ready and eager to take their places, Chicago was full of unemployed men, but it was thought well to bring in strangers, who would be less under the influence of local feeling. Eecruiting bureaux were opened at New York and Philadelphia. Several hundred train-men were engaged and shipped to Chicago. Switchmen were promised 65 dollars a month for 10 hours' daily work, and extra pay for overtime. One of the first thousand of these im- ported blacklegs explained his point of view to a newspaper interviewer in terms which explain simply and clearly exactly how it was the strike failed. He said : — " I am from Cleveland and I've been a railroader eiglit years. When business got elack last winter I was pulled off with several others, and I haven't worked live weeks altogether since the first of the year. I have a wife and three children depending on me, and for six months we have been living from hand to mouth. When the agent who hired me to come to Chicago asked me if I would go, I told him I would see my wife first. I went home and found her in tears at the dreary outlook. My children were actually in want of bread, and it didn't take me long to make up my mind about coming to Chicago. I am a Union man at heart, but when wife and children are in danger of starving I feel it my duty to work for them, even should I be killed in the endeavour. There are lots of men here who feel the same way." The strikers were of course furious at the introduc- tion of these fresh hands. Murderous threats were made, but comparatively few were executed. They were boycotted. Hotels that gave them shelter were shunned as if they had the pestilence, but beyond some ugly kicking and beating, the " scabs " were not I much injured. Vice-president Howard, of the American Railway Union, swore that when the strike was won, scant mercy would be shown either to "scabs" or to the "bladder-bellied bosses." " Before we will allow any road now tied up to resume operations they must promise to withdraw from tlie General Manager's Association, they must haul 246 Chicago To-Day, no more Pullman's ctir,?, they must put every one of you back to work, and every ' scab,' that they have hired must be made to walk the plank. I want to sound a note of warning to every 'scab' right now, no matter what the colour of his hair, that we have got a combination that will drive them into the depths of the sea. When this fight is over they cannot stay on this continent." The second week of the strike saw all these seething, fermenting elements of social strife come to a head, before the authorities were ready to deal with them. There seems to be little doubt that the police force of the city, like everyone else, were more or less in sympathy with the strikers. Trained as a force not to see whatever they do not want to see, whether it be a public gaming-house, or the offences of those who have a " pull," the police found little difficulty in winking hard at the outrages of the strikers. The Chicago Tribune bitterly complained of their supine - ness. It says : — ■ "Nearly 150 officers are supposed to be guarding the Illinois Central from riotous strikers ; tliere have been riot, disorders, and violence of every sort, but the police have neither arrested any of the offenders nor stopped tlie law- less acts. When asked they invariably deny there has been any trouble. They denied that a freight car was burned at Burnside, Wednesday night ; that the box of yard engines was cut ; that a mail train and the Diamond Special were stopped last night; that engines have been cut off trains and ' killed,' or that any sort of trouble has occurred on the Illinois Central. The police, who are ostensibly guarding the place, know nothing about it." Naturally emboldened by their impunity, the strikers and their sympathisers, who include practi- cally every one who earns daily wages and a very great many others, showed no disposition to relax their hold upon the railroads. They had disarmed the deputy-marshals at Blue Island ; they showed on July 3rd that they were equally ready to defy the Illinois state troops. The militia ordered from Springfield to Danville had to start the train them- selves and then were stopped by finding five hundred yards of the railway had been torn up by the mob. Still the local authorities hesitated to shoot. They How the Conflict was Fought out. 247 made preparations. Springfield army rifles were piled up in the sheriff's office, and Marshal Arnold brought quantities of the new " riot gun," which seems to be not unlike the weapon which earned Mr. Forster his Buckshot soubriquet. An admiring reporter noted that the gun is loaded with six three- inch twelve-calibre cartridges which can be discharged one after the other in five seconds. Each cartridge contains twelve buckshot about the size of peas. When the cartridge is discharged the shots scatter, seventy-two of them flying in the direction of the rioters in five seconds. The gun can be emptied and reloaded several times in each minute. But the riot gun was not issued until after Independence Day. Down in Colorado an irate marshal, baffled by the sympathy which led his deputies to lay down their arms at the summons of the strikers, declared he would hereafter hire " any kind of deputies, hoboes, horse thieves, etc., just so they are willing to fight." Detective agencies offered to get him all the men required who would fight, and the manager of one agency was started out to recruit specials. It was evident, however, that the forces of law and of disorder could not Ions; continue facino- each other without a crisis. This was precipitated on both sides almost simultaneously. President Cleveland took the initiative on one side, the incendiaries on the other. The Federal Government, finding the mails stopped in all directions, interstate -commerce inter- rupted, and the lines administered by receivers representing the United States Courts interfered with, suddenly struck a decisive blow and ordered 1,300 Federal troops of all arms to Chicago, sending at the same time General Miles to take charge of the operations against the rioters. 248 Chicago T 0-Day. It was on the 3rd that the 15th Eegiment of Federal troops arrived at Blue Island and at once raised the blockade. Next day other companies occupied the dockyards, and took up a position at Grand Crossing. It was a strange Independence Day this year at Chicago. The city was almost in a state of siege. Besides the armed deputy marshals, and th(3 Illinois State troops, Federal cavalry and infantry, with Catling and Hotchkiss guns, held positions of vantage in the city, and at night the small army of horse and foot artillery encamped on the Lake Front in readiness to be launched in any direction against the rioters. Their presence in the city was not relished by the citizens. Governor Altgeld tele- graphed vehement protests against the unnecessary and illegal intrusion of Federal troops into the State of Illinois. Mayor Hopkins also sneered at the soldiers. " We know nothing about the Federal troops. They were brought here for a purpose. They sit a-top of cars. We want men who will get down upon the ground to do their duty." It seems almost incredible that, with a volcano of anarchy beneath their feet, these men could have deemed it necessary to stand on constitutional pedantries and refuse to welcome the advent of a solid disciplined force of armed men upon whom they could absolutely rely to maintain order in Chicago. The first collision between the Federal troops and the rioters took j^lace on July 5. A Dalziel telegram reports it as follows : — " The Michigan Central Railway attempted to-day to run a train full of live stock, consisting of seventeen trucks, from tlie stockyards, but it was surrounded by a crowd of 8,000 men and boys, who uncoupled the cars and captured the train. Upon the news reaching the authorities a detachment of the regular army, numbering ninety men, was ordered to the stock-yards, and they cliarged a mob of some 3,000 rioters. Two troops of cavalry and a battery of artillery arrived a few minutes afterwards, and the combined How the Conflict was Fought out. 249 forces drove the mob back. Gatling guns have been placed in positions commanding all the streets leading to the yards. A train of empty cars was run into the station in the forenoon to be loaded with stock, but tho men in the yard refused to load it, and the trucks are now standing empty." From which it would seem that the fruits of victory- remained with the strikers, for they had effectively prevented the loading of the trucks. This, however, was not much worse than what had been going on from the first. It needed a sterner lesson to rouse the authorities to a sense of the dangers of the position. The lesson that was needed was not lono; in comins;. Anarchic labour, confronted by disciplined soldiery with Gatlings, replied by the torch. On the night of July 5th incendiaries set fire in three places to the famous buildings of the World's Fair, and in two hours the one splendid beautiful thing that Chicago had ever created was reduced to a wilderness of eighty acres of ashes and gaunt and twisted girders. To those who have seen that fairy dream of splendour, the Court of Honour, no violence could more rudely symbolise the triumph of barbarism over civilisa- tion than this destruction of the World's Fair by the fire of the incendiary. The Court of Honour, with its palaces surrounding the great fountain, the slender columns of the peristyle, and the golden dome of the Administration Building, formed a picture the like of which the world has not seen before. They might have been hewn out of solid marble, those great palaces of staff, but it would have been impossible to have produced the delicacy of the moulding and the lightness of the tracery in any less plastic material than that which yielded such marvellous results in the hands of the architects of the World's Fair. Once only, a long time ago, I rememl)er feeling 250 Chicago To- Day. the same thrill produced by architectural effect. It was on my first visit to Edinburgh, when I was a boy still in my teens. Driving along Princes Street, past the museums, I saw looming up high before me the castle of the northern capital. The curious blending of the associations of Greek architecture with Scottish romance produced a somewhat similar effect to that which was produced by the architecture alone, without any historical associations or romantic traditions, at the "World's Fair. The long stately lines of the great palaces, the glory of the colonnades, and the beauty of the lagoons, in which the great buildings were mirrored, when the waters were not disturbed by the gondolas, left an impression of perfect beauty and of stately symmetry I have never seen equalled in any of the most famous architectural marvels of the Old World. The Colos- seum, or the ruins of the Forum, and the great mediaeval cathedrals of Europe, have associations of history and of tradition which immensely re-enforce the influence of architectural genius. In the World's Fair the architecture alone produced the effect. The buildings were new from the architect's hands. It is a great tribute to the genius of the builders that the buildings which they reared could produce an in- stant and abiding effect equal to that which emanates from the ancient buildings round which hang the purple mist of centuries and of song. On the night of the 31st of October the great buildings were illuminated for the last time. The fountains did not impress me as being superior to those of the Paris Exhibition, but nothing that I have ever seen in Paris, in London, in St. Petersburg, or in Pome, could equal the effect produced by the illumination of these great white palaces that autumn Hoiv the Conflict was Fotight out. 251 niglit. Overhead stretched a cloudless sky, iu which the stars gleamed faintly. Beneath the stars the lake lay dark and sombre, but on its shores gleamed and glowed in golden radiance the ivory city, beautiful as a poet's dream, silent as a city of the dead. It was more wonderful to have seen that city in the silence and solitude, with no one near except lonely sieiitseers flittino; like wanderino; ghosts across the electric-lighted squares into the dark shadows of the projecting buildings, than to have seen it even on Chicago Day, when three-cjuarters of a million visitors crowded into Jackson Park, filling the Fair with a human exhibit more marvellous than the Exhibition itself. If a thing of beauty is a joy for ever, then that vision of the White City by night, silent and desolate, was well worth crossing the Atlantic to see, Mr. Graham, the Director of Works, and several of the builders who had helped in the construction of the White City, assured me, that the buildings would last for ten or fifteen years if they were preserved merely as architectural monuments. To preserve them as buildings in which exhibits might be shown would cost a great deal of money, but merely to preserve the architectural effect, which was all that I cared for, would cost next to nothing. The architectural glories of the World's Fair, the one unique thing about the great Columbian Exposition, could be preserved for the miserable sum of £5,000 a year. The smaller buildings of course would come down, but the great edifices round the Court of Honour, and those which formed the vista looking down from the Administration Buildinei: to the Art Palace, these could be preserved at a cost, so far as the architect was concerned, of £5,000 a year. It seemed monstrous that a city which had subscribed 252 Chicago To-Day. a million pounds to put up the Fair, sliould grudge such a bagatelle to preserve for ten or twenty years its most characteristic feature. When the facts were set forth a great deal of discussion followed, and the buildings were ultimately handed over to the South Park Commissioners, who professed an intention to preserve them. Unfortunately, however, this intention did not in- clude a resolution to protect them from fire. A trifling outlay and a comparatively small exercise of authority would have kept the place clear from intruders, and preserved, at least until the next century, a vision of beauty and of architectural glory the like of which cannot be seen elsewhere. But Chicago, great in executing enterprises which can be executed under the stress and strain of a strong stimulus, is not equally great in preserving and maintainino' that which she has created. It is diffi.- cult to know whether most to admire the resolution and energy which created the White City, or to deplore the fatuity which led such mediocrities as the South Park Commissioners to fool away by their negligence what should have been regarded as the heirloom of the Continent, a priceless heritage which" would reflect glory upon Chicago. Time and again fires broke out during the winter, destroying one building after another, but still the Court of Honour remained. But it only lingered to supply the crowning illustration of the vandalism of anarchy. On the night of the 5th of July all the buildings round the Court of Honour were destroyed, including the administration, the manufactures, the electricity, the mining, the machinery, and the agri- cultural buildings, together with the terminal station. Among these — the greatest of all the buildings of y ^i' '■ W 2 54 Chicago To-Day. the Fair — the greatest building with which mortal man ever enclosed space — was that dedicated to manufactures. Mr. "Washington Porter conceited the idea of transporting this immense structure of glass and iron from Jackson Park to the lake front, which was to have l^een a Crystal Palace for Chicago, and a Bureau of Labour for the toilers. That dream is ended now. Incendiarism once begun is not easy to check. The whole of the next day and the day after the southern suburbs of Chicago were given over to riotous mobs who wrecked the railways, overturned cars, and made bonfires of the rolling stock. Mayor Hopkins frankly declared that the forces at his disposal were unable to answer for order in his own suburb of Kensington, and he therefore appealed to Governor Altgeld to call out the entire State force of Northern Illinois. He issued a proclamation calling upon all well-disposed citizens to abstain from congregating in crowds, as a collision between the troops and the rioters was probable. And still, after all this, after the burning of the World's Fair, and after the establishment of the reign of terror in Southern Chicago, Governor Altgeld telegraphed more urgently than ever for the withdrawal of the Federal troops ! The night of July 6 will long be remembered in Chicago. Until midnight the mobs held full control of the entire southern suburbs of Chicago, roaming through the extensive railway yards at Grand Cross- ing, Burnside, Kensington, Fordham, Morgan Park, and Hawthorne, and burning in repeated incendiary fires over 1,000 cars, including many Pullman coaches, as well as barns, signal- towers, and storehouses. The loss is estimated at three million dollars. Only a hand- ful of troops and police l)eing there, the mobs did what 256 Chicago To-Day. they liked. The loss affects all the railways running southward from Chicago, During the contests the known casualties are two men killed and eight fatally injured. One striker shot at and killed another, being forthwith killed by a third. The Fire Brigade, having answered sixty calls in the course of the two days, was exhausted. 5,000 Illinois troops were massed in the city. 1,200 Federal troops were also in Chicago. It was thought not improbable that martial law would have to be proclaimed, and that the President might ask the Governors of New York and Pennsylvania for 20,000 of the National Guards to restore order in Illinois. Fortunately there was no need to resort to such an extreme measure, which might have precipitated civil war. At midnight on the 6th the work of restorino; order was begun. The 1st Illinois Regiment cleared the mob out of the suburbs. The 15th occupied the railway yards and the approaches to the stock-yards. But it was not till next day that the rioters realised that they were at last face to face with men who would not hesitate to shoot. A company of the 2nd Illinois Regiment was attacked while engaged in clearing the Grand Trunk line in 47 th Street of de- railed cars by an immense crowd, led on by one John Burke, who overwhelmed the soldiers with a shower of stones. The lieutenant was felled with a coupling pin, and the soldiers were driven back to the cars. They fired and then charged with the bayonet, wounding twenty rioters, including Burke, who died from the eftects of the wound. They were, however, unable to hold their own, and were compelled to retreat to the cars, where they were besieged. The mob meanwhile began tearing up the tracks. Rein- How the Conflict was Fought 02it. 257 forcements were soon at hand, and the mob fled. At Englewood, in 16th Street, and other phaces, there were shots fired, and charges with the bayonet. The police estimate that 50,000 men, strikers, idlers and marauders, many of them foreigners, had for two days held undisputed control over the suburbs of Chicago. They had burnt cars, looted railway sheds, wrecked railway shops, torn up rails, and generally spread devastation through the city, entail- ing a loss estimated in hard cash at six million dollars. And the total amount raised l^y the Central Relief Association to provide for the unemployed last winter in Chicago was only 133,000 dollars. The authorities, now thoroughly aroused, agreed to sink constitutional hairsplitting and work together. Gen. Miles with the Federal soldiers, and (jen. Wheeler with the Illinois troops, agreed with Maj^or Hopkins upon a plan of operations. They established an armed camp from which reinforcements could easily be despatched in any direction, and made it known throughout the city that orders had been given to shoot, and to shoot, if need be, to kill. Gen. Miles with his regulars undertook to protect the Government ]3uildings and the railway stations. The Mayor with the State troops and the police guarded the railway yards and dispersed the mob. The deputy-marshals with the police protected the stock-yards and the railway stations on the south. It was agreed that Gen. Miles would only charge when the Mayor asked him to do so. Altogether there were 10,000 armed men at the disposal of the authorities. Rioting ceased, incendiarism was checked. The trains began to move. Meanwhile opinion was still fiercely divided about the merits of the strike and the right of President 258 Chicago To- Day. Cleveland to interfere in tlie dispute. The strikers and tlieir friends pinned white favours to their button- holes, while the admirers of the President sported as favours the Stars and Stripes — a curious latter-day imitation of the familiar badges of York and Lan- caster in the Wars of the Koses. The Chicago Trade and Labour Assembly con- demned the intervention of the Federal power. The Governors of Colorado, Idaho, and Oregon supported the protests of Governor Altgeld. But President Cleveland went straight on. He took possession by his soldiers of the Northern Pacific and the Union Pacific, and operated both as post and military roads, working them as part of the military establish- ment. Then on Sunday night, the 8th July, Presi- dent Cleveland launched his Proclamation, the effect of which was to put Chicago and the other disturbed districts under martial law. The following is the text of this famous document : — "Whereas by reason of the unlawful obstructions, combinations, and assemblages of persons, it lias become impracticable, in the judgment of the President, to enforce by the ordinary course of judicial procedure by the laws of the United States with the State of Illinois, and especially the city of Chicago, and, whereas for the purpose of enforcing the faithful execution of the laws of the States, protecting property and removing obstructions to United States mails in the State and city aforesaid, the President has employed part of the military forces of the United States. "Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States, do hereby admonish all good citizens, and all persons who may be or may become within the city and State aforesaid against aiding, countenaucingj encouraging, or taking part in sTich unlawful obstructions, combinations, or assemblages. I hereby warn all persons engaged in or in any way connected with the unlawful obstructions, combinations, or assemblages to disper.-e and retire peaceably to their respective abodes on or before 12 o'clock noon on the 9th day of July. Those who disregard this warning and persist in taking part with the riotous mob in forcibly resisting or obstructing the execution of the laws of the United States, or interfering with the functions, of Government, or destroying or attempting to destroy property belonging to the United States, or under its protection, cannot be regarded otherwise than public enemies. The troops employed against such riotous mob will act with all moderation and forbearance consistent with the accomplishment of the desired end ; but stern necessities confront them, and will not with certainty permit a discrimination between the guilty participants and those How the Conjiict was Fmight 07tt. 259 ■who may be mingled with them through curiosity and without criminal intent. The only safe course, therefore, for .those not actually unlawfully participating is to abide in their own homes, or not to be found in the neigh- bourhood of riotous assemblages. While there will be no hesitation or vacillation in the decisive treatment of the guilty, the warning is especially intended to protect the innocent. Whereof, I hereunto set my hand, and have caused the Seal of the United States to be hereto afiSxed. " Done at the city of Washington, the 8th day of July, in the year of Our Lord one thousand eight hundred and ninety-four, and in the year of the Independence of the United States of America one hundred and eighteenth. "(Signed) Grover Cleveland, President. " W. Q. Gresham, Secretary of State." At the same time 1800 additional Federal troops were ordered up to Fort Sheridan to be ready in case General Miles should need reinforcements. Fortunately there was no need for these extra batteries of artillery and troops of cavalry. The last serious fight took place at Hammond, in Indiana, which from the first had been a centre of violent opposition to the running of the trains. Hammond, although close to Chicago, is in Indiana, and the rioters took full advantage of the frontier. When the Indiana troops appeared, they retreated to Illinois ; when the Illinois soldiers were to the front, they retired to Indiana. It was not till the 8th, when the Governors agreed to allow their respective forces to operate as one body irrespective of frontiers that order was restored. But here, as elsewhere, the Federal troops acted with decisive effect. On Sunday after- noon at four o'clock a mail train from Indiana- polis approached Hammond, carrying on board a strong body of Federal troops. Nothing daunted, the mob attacked the train. The soldiers replied by a volley, and then followed it up with a bayonet charge. Four persons were killed and twelve wounded. The mail train got through, but it was not until heavy reinforcements of State troops had arrived, and after many afirays had taken place, that the Hammond blockade came to a close. s 2 26o Chicago To-Day . The Trade and Labour Assembly, when it heard of President Cleveland's proclamation, replied Ijy unanimously voting for a general strike. But, not- withstanding the valorous resolve of the newsboys — one thousand of whom struck against selling the papers which opposed the strike — the appeal met with only half-hearted support The railways had too obviously triumphed. Their trains were moving. The courts were moving. Mr. Debs and his colleagues were arrested and committed for trial,* and the business men hoisted flags to commemorate the defeat of Labour. There were many mutterings of discontent, and threats of a general cessation of work which could not be made good. But discipline, organization and wealth had triumphed, and Labour could only lament over the catastrophe w^hich it had courted. It would have been better if it had only lamented, instead of seeking to make bad worse by resorting to dynamite. The infernal machine with which an engine on the Santa Fe Eailway was blown up on July 8th was an ugly incident. So also was the miction of those men who threw a railway train over a Ijridge into the river at Sacramento, killing six of the soldiers who were on board. The struggle was singularly free from acts of exceptional ferocity. Considering that the great city lay practically at the mercy of the rioters for a week, it is marvellous how few lives were lost. To put ten thousand soldiers into the field against fifty thousand rioters, all more or less armed, and to succeed in restoring peace without killing twenty persons is an achievement of which no other country but America can boast. * As I write the cable reports that Mr. Debs and other strike leaders liave been committed to gaol in default of bail. 26r Chapter III. — A Stormy Outlook. The suppression of tlie industrial revolt settles nothing and proves nothing, excepting what was only too well known before. But it illustrates much, and it may be it will supply something of the needed stimulus to rouse the apathetic easy-going American to action. The strike against the Railroads only brino;s into clearer relief the fact that Labour in America is not yet anything like prepared to enter the lists in serious earnest. Labour, in its present disorganised, undisciplined and irreligious condition, is doomed to writhe helpless for some time longer beneath the ironshod heel of Capital. It may from time to time flounder into a Jacquerie in which torch and dynamite will enable it to inflict hideous wounds upon its adversaries, but more than that lies beyond, its reach. Religion, save the religion of a common hate, does not exist to bind together into an organic l)ody the working classes of America. And until they get religion in some way or other, understanding by that much-abused term, sufficient faith in each other to trust their comrades, sufficient confidence in the ultimate triumph of their cause as to be willing to make the daily sacrifice that is involved in loyal obedience and punctual payment of dues to their chiefs, they will remain as they are at present, a hopeless, helpless, blaspheming, writhing crowd,, whose only plan of campaign is reliance upon the sporadic violence of excited mobs when confronted by the organised forces of the existing order. 262 Chuago To-Day. Speaking of the struggle, before it culminated in disastrous defeat, Mr. Sam Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labour, said : — " The effect of the Pullman boycott and strike will be to teach capitalists, syndicates and trusts tliat it will be to their interest to make concessions to the working people that they have not made heretofore. Capitalists and cor- porations should be conciliatory, not arrogant. The isolation of employers and employees is not possible — the two should be on friendly terms. The movement brought on foot by the American Railway Union shows the rising tide of the labour movement. It inaugurates the era of mutual concessions. It is a protest against the frightful conditions existing. It must act as a fiheck to the arrogance of the moneyed classes." Unfortunately it is likely to have exactly the opposite effect for a time. To give your opponent an opportunity of proving that in a stand-up fight he can whip you as easily as Corbet whipped Mitchell, is not exactly the best way to check his " arrogance." The real ground for hope must be found elsewhere. This Pullman boycott and strike is the Bull's Run of Labour, and as it needed the disaster of Bull's Run to teach the North that they must organize and sacrifice for victory, so even this cruel and crushing blow may be the saving of the industrial classes in the L^nited States. It is with themselves that the work of regeneration must begin. And until they substitute practical organization for windy blather, and loyal obedience to their chosen chiefs for an almost demoniac distrust of all and sundry, they will make little progress. When reading such a manifesto as that which Mr. Sovereign, General Master of the Knights of Labour, addressed to that Order on the eve of this recent strike, it is difiicult to resist the feeling that American trades' unionism has l:)een dry- nursed upon the Fourth of July oratory and the unreal platitudes of the conventional pulpit. Mr. Sovereign's manifesto is as follows : — " All Knights of Labour have pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honour to the emancipation of the industrial masses from the shackles A Stormy OiUlcok. 263 of greed and oppression with the same fortitude that actuated the revolu- tionary fathers more than a century ago. Then, as your general master workman, I take the liberty to direct the officers of all local assemblies of our order to call special meetings, discuss the Pullman boycott, and the corpora- tions lending their influence in support of its determined policy to dominate over the God-given rights of its employees. Notify the travelling public tliat those who patronise Pullman coaches will receive no patronage from the Knights of Labour, and order such other assistance as lies within our power to give. Temper all your acts with mercy. In all things be peaceable and law-abiding, but do not relax your determination to triumph in this etruggle over corporate greed. And if the exigences of the times force a re-adjustment, let it be an unconditional surrender of corporate powers and privileges, and an uncompromising demand for the utter elimination of private interests in the operation of any of the means of transporting passenger and freight, and if we are compelled to strike let it bo in the spirit of the patriots of 76." Strike for your altars and your fiies : Strike for the green graves of your siree; Strike till greed and avarice expiree, God and 3'our native land. It will take something a great deal more solid than this flatulent flap-doodle to disturb the " Robber Barons " in their constitution- guarded castles. In the frontispiece I reproduce a German cartoon repre- senting Labour, preyed upon by the vam2:)ire of Capitalism. The worst vampire that preys upon Labour in America is not Capitalism, but the fatal lack of that spirit of loyal brotherhood, which is the indispensable foundation of all effective co-opera- tion. The workers are numerous enough to control everything, if they cared to do so. But they care more for party shibboleths and sectarian feuds than for the weio;htier matter of the law which ooverns their lives, and the lives of their children. At the same time it is idle to cast stones at the blind anarchist whose torch has just proved that its deadly efficiency is quite as great in the new world as it has ever been in the old. The existence of such savage passions, all unrestrained, as those which led to the night of terror of the 5 th of July, is a reproach to the community at large and a menace as well as a reproach. 264 Chicago To-Day. According to the latest Government statistics, the Americans possess sixty billions of wealth. Nine per cent, of the families own 7 1 per cent, of this, leaving but 29 per cent, to the remaining 91 per cent, of the families. The 9 per cent, is composed of two classes : rich and millionnaires. Of the latter there are 4074 families. They average three million dollars each. They constitute only three one-hundredths of 1 per cent, of the whole number of families, while they own 20 per cent, of the wealth. That is, they own nearly as much as the 11,593,887 families. The process of accumulation goes on irresistibly. The snowball gathers as it grows. Even spendthrifts and prodigals cannot dissipate the unearned increment of their millions which multiply while they sleep. The millionnaire is developing into the billionnaire, and the end is not yet. The transformation is hidden from the multitude because the coming despot eschews the tawdry tinsel of the crown, and liberty is believed to be as safe as — well, let us say, as the populace of Eome believed the republic to be when Julius Csesar refused the imperial purple. But every- where the money power has the people l)y the throat. The ablest men in the United States see this and deplore it. But what are they doing to mend it ? Even the modest proposal to levy a small income tax is denounced as " un-American," and the modifi- cation of the tariff seems as far off as ever. Mayor Pingree, of Detroit, sent out as his Christmas card an extract from a letter said to have been written by President Lincoln, shortly before his death, with the pertinent question : " What are you going to do about it ? " The authenticity of the letter has been disputed. But there is no doubt that, genuine or not, the sentiments imputed to Lincoln are believed by A StoTiny Ontlook. 265 millions to l)e well justified. After rejoicing that the war with the South is nearing its close, the- letter proceeds : — " It has indeed been a trying time for the Re- public ; but I see in the near future a crisis approach- ing that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As the result of the war, corporations have been enthroned, and an era of corruption in high places will follow ; and the money power of the country will endeavour to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people, until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands, and the Republic is destroyed. I feel at this moment more anxiety for the safety of my country than ever before, even in the midst of war. God grant that my suspicions may be groundless." " What a wonderful prophecy," adds Mayor Pin- gree, " and how terribly it is being fulfilled ! " But what is to be done ? The way out — which in England seems to lie in the progressive muni- cipalization of all monopolies of service, and in the assumption by the State, step by step, of all the functions of distribution that are manifestly capable of enlarged management — is barred in America by the flagrant corruption that prevails in the City Governments. Take, for instance, the nationaliza- tion of the railways, or even of the telegraphs, as- a way of escape from such troul^les as this Pullman strike. Who is there who would recommend the addition of such burdens to the responsibilities of an Administration which to this day subordinates Civil Service Reform to the Spoils system ? How can the management of immense properties be entrusted to venal aldermen and ward politicians ? The remedy, of course, is the old, old specific. There 2 66 Chicago To-Day. inust be a revival of civic relio;ion in America if the State is to be saved. Until the honest folk will take the trouble of governing, the rogues will have it all their own way. Thus, once again we come back to the lack of real religion as the one deadly peril which confronts us at every turn. The task before the Americans is hard enouo-h in O itself, as we all know only too well who have to try to solve our own problems of the same kind. But in the United States the task is rendered infinitely more onerous by the fact that Americans in one respect suffer from the same curse which plagues the Irish. Ireland would never have been too trouble- isome if the Irish had been able to secure redress for their grievances as ra^^idly as the English and the Scotch, Unfortunately, owing to the remoteness of the legislature and the impossibility of compelling the House of Lords to recognise the imperative need for legislation until the time had passed when legislation •could be useful, the Irish problem has become almost insoluble. The American industrial problem may go the same road for the same cause, for the Irish are mot more hopelessly hampered by our House of Lords than the Americans are by their written Constitution. As to the obstacles in the. way of getting any reforms in the States, Mr. G-. W. Smalley may be -accepted as an unimpeachable authority. In a recent article in an English Review, Mr. Smalley says : — " Aforetime it may have been a paradox, but it is now the mere simplicity •of truth to say that America is probably the most Conservative country iu 'the world. It is, I think, admitted by the best writers that in some very •essential particulars the English Constitution is far more democratic than the American. The English machine is so contrived as to respond quickly and pretty surely to external pressure. Touch a button, and j^ou turn out a Cilovernment. Touch another, and you modify your Constitution. In .America there is no great use in touching buttons. The machine does not respond ; or does not respond till after a considerable length of time. We ;are ruled by a President who is in for four years, and cannot be removed <'xccpt by impeachment. As a rule, the Houee of Representatives elected A Stormy Outlook. 267 for the second half of the Presidential term has a majority of his opponents, but to that he pays no attention. He and his cabinet are independent of hostile votes in Conga-ess. A new House of Commons in England, elected all at once on some issue of the moment, meets, or may meet, almost at once. The American House of Eepresentatives, elected in November of one year, -does not, unless specially summoned, meet till December of the year following. In the interval many things may have happened. People have time to consider whether they really want it altered, or radically altered, or not, and jmblic opinion is brought to bear on Congress with great force ; the force being always for deliberation and delay." It would be difficult to state more accurately the actual working of the American system of govern- ment. It is based upon the principle that whenever the people make up their minds it is so certain they will be mistaken that they must be prevented by every conceivable constitutional arrangement from having their way. After a measure gets through the House of Rej)re- sentatives, there is the Senate to be reckoned with, and the Senate is an extremely conservative body — a millionnaire's club it is often called. It is a pluto- cratic machine, but with more power than our House of Lords. The constitution of the Senate, as i\Ir. Smalley takes pains to point out, is absolutely opposed to the principle of representative government, which insists upon some proportion between the numl^ers represented and the number of representatives : — "The checks upon ordinary legislation, including the fixed four years' term of the Executive, the Presidential veto which is frequently used (President Cleveland, during his first term, vetoed more than a hundred bills), the co- ordinate and, in all respects but one, co-equal legislative powers of the Senate and House of Eepresentatives, the long interval between the election and the meeting of Congress, the legislative continuity of the Senate with its six years' tenure, which is never renewed all at once, but by thirds eacli two years, the revising jurisdiction of the Supreme Court — these and other limi- tations must seem to the English Eadical very numerous and obstructive. To the English Conservative they may throw some ligijt upon the strength of that Conservatism in America of which he is Ijeginning to discover the existence. But they are as nothing to the checks upon legislation affecting the fundamental law, or, in American phrase, amendments to the Con- stitution." And here again Mr. Smalley is quite right. No more careful provision has ever been made for secur- 268 Chicago To- Day. ing the subordination of the interests of the living to the iron grasp of the dead hand than that which is laid down in the provisions for amending the Ameri- can constitution. Before any amendment can be made in this ancient document, drawn up by men living on the eastern fringe of the American Conti- nent, none of whom dreamed of legislating for the Pacific Slope or for seventy millions of people, the following procedure has to be gone through : — The proposed reform must be carried first by two-thirds majority in the House of Kepresentatives, and then by a two-thirds majority of the Senate. AVhen this has been done, the amendment must be sent down to each of the separate States of the Federal Union. Of these there are forty-four, and each of them has two separate legislative bodies. Mr. Smalley says : — " These States occupy half the North American Continent ; each one of them has a Constitution of its own ; each has a population with distinctive traits and a strong State feeling ; their legislatures are chosen under varying: conditions of suftrage, meet at different periods of the year, and prescribe each their own methods of procedure. Yet three-fourths of them must concur in an amendment. If there be one less than three-fourths, the amendment fails." But even this imposing array of checks upon the popular will does not satisfy the conservative Ameri- can. Mr. Smalley says : — " Suppose a law to have run all these gauntlets, to have passed the House and the Senate, and, if a constitutional amendment, three-fourths of the State Legislatures ; suppose it to have escaped the President's veto, or been passed over it by a vote of two-thirds of both houses, it has still to take its chance of being declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of the United States. That is one more check, and it is also a check which cannot be got rid of, as. all the others may, by eventually electing a new House, or a new Senate, or a new President. The Supreme Court is not an elective body, and I suppose- that might seem to the English Eadical a sufficient reason for sweeping it away. The judges are appointed for life by the President. They are responsible to no popular tribunal, not even to public opinion. They sit as a. Court of pure law ; the final authority from which in all America there is no. appeal. Their jurisdiction, strictly defined though it be, is co-extensive with the whole Union. It ia the one instance in liistory in which popular sovereignty, acknowledged as supreme in the long run for every other purpose ai d over every other authority to which it has delega!ed power. A Stormy Outlook. 269 submits to a master whom it did not appoint, and c streets. The curse of Chicago to-day is that so many men and women have got used to seeing sin. Does Mr. Stead state the facts truly? I have nut seen them contradicted as yet. Mr. Stead mikes very sirious statements; his book is a searching east wind. If he has t Id the truth we ought to hide our face in ghame and confusion, and then take action. The truth is pitiless, let tlio facts l^e known." The Kev. Lyman Abbott, New York. The OutlojJc, which is edited by Dr. Lymau Abbott, and which is the most influential Christian newspapor iu the United States, says that the book " is graphic and true. Mr. Stead has made a study of the dark side of the most T 2 276 Appendix. characteristic of American cities, anJ has told without reserve what lie ha^ seen. Tliere is nothing salacious or prurient iu his book. It does not minister to an idle or a depraved curiosity. Its light is the light of God'd judgment day shining in on the dark places of vice and sin. He is bold to- audacity, and absohitely uncompromising. He hates hypocrisy and decep- tion, and most of all that commonest form of hypocrisy, self-deception. His book is one to make men angry, because it is unsparing of the higher and more reputable forms of sin, and justly holds selfish greed in honoured forms and eminent places responsible for the vice and degradation that hides away from common sight. But we are glad that Mr. Stead lias written it. and we hope that not Chicago only, but other cities as well, will read it and take its lessons to heart." The Rev. Washington Gladden. The Rev. Washington Gladden preaching upon the book at Columbus, 0., said " that it was an indication of the bloody revolution that was coming quickly in this country if needed reforms were not secured in other ways. How any thinking man could read the book and still believe that America •was the best governed country in the world was a mystery to him." The Rev. W. Walsh, Newcastle-on-Ttne. The Rev. W. Walsh, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, reviewing the book, says : — " Mr. Stead and his descent upon Chicago are irresistibly suggestive of Jonah and his apostolate in Nineveh. If journalism is Mr. Stead's pro- fession, preaching is his vocation. He is a preacher to the age. He has to an almost unprecedented degree the preacher's gift of swift keen insight into the divinity and the devilment of human life. If this book of his is not a volume of sermons it is veritably one long preachment. For siich a preaclier and such a sermon the Lord's name be praised. Mr. Stead has a gospel as well as a policy, and this gospel constitutes the soul and spirit of the whole discourse. We hear a good deal about municipal reforms and municipal socialism, and what not, but it has been left to Mr. Stead to elevate all this municipal experience into tlie glory and grandeur of a gospel. Mr. Stead's book will do more to further tlie cause of public religion than all the sermons which have been preaclied in Christendom during the last twelve months." THE PRESS IN AMERICA. Mr. B. 0. Flower, editor of the Arena, writing in that Review, says : — "'If Christ Came to Chicago 'is one of the bravest, noblest of all the profoundly religious books which have appeared in the last century, and when I say religious, I use tlie term in its highest and truest sense. It is an earnest, passionate, and sympathetic plea for the union of all who love in the service of all who suffer. But it is more than this. It is a bold un- masking and setting fortli of rapacious greed, and of that conventionat immorality which is poisoning tlie blood of the nations. It reveals the utter heartlessness of conventionalism in religion-, social, and political life. This book has grealy alarmed Plutocracy. It has frightened the plunderers of the i^cople, as is evidenced by the savage, unjust and false attacks which have been made upon it by certain fawning spaniels of Plutocracy. The vicious sj^irit of conventional immorality on the one hand, and alarmed Plutocracy Appendix. 277 on the other, has represented this book as vile, coarse, aud indecent. As a matter of fact, Mr. Stead's book is profoundly religious, and breathes forth from cover to cover a spirit of sturdy morality. I hope that all readers of the Arena ■will secure a copy of Mr. Stead's book, and that, after reading it, they will lend it to their friends. I believe it is one of the most valuable books which has been produced during the past thirty years. It is just the book that is needed at the present time, and will do a great deal toward helping us •out of the jjresent social quagmire." The Chicago Tribune says : — " The book really belongs to a class of litera- ture which is denominated obscene, and as such ought to be suppressed. It is all the more dangerous to public morals, for it was written with a good purpose, while actually it is a directory of sin. . . . All those who have any respect for themselves will leave the book alone as too vile a thing to be touched by the fingers of decency." The Cliicago Dispatch, the one paper in Ciiicago which stuffs its atlvertising •columns with advertisements of houses of ill-fame, says : — " The book is flat, stale, and should be unprofitable. It is so libellous and so scurrilous that the greatest book concerns in America have refused to handle it. Who is Stead? An es-convict, charlatan, an advertiser of filth and vice, a man whose sole claim to notoriety is the crimes he has committed against law and morality, and who holds his place in the public estimation through false pretences. Stead may be permitted to go as one would spurn a mangy dog." The Chicago Record, the morning paper which has the largest circulation, says : — " From beginning to end the book bristles with startling revelations, bitter denunciations, and wholesale exposures of the city's inmost workings in all its various pliases. Every existing moral, physical and spiritual condition •of the people, without regard to age, sex, or condition of bank account, is subjected to a fire of criticism utterly scathing and merciless." The Inter-Ocean publishes a copious analysis of the book, and laments that it is certain to give the enemies of Chicago occasion to blaspheme. The Cliicago Herald says : — '* The book contains nothing that is novel. Much of it IS a mere paraphrase of old newspaper reports relating to past events, which are disgracefully notorious in the criminal history of the ■city. The story of the slums is the same old story. The descriptions of poverty and vice are not peculiar to Chicago. The book required some labour. The matter was only to be procured in many out-of-the-way rei^ulsive places from which sickening sights and suff"ocatiug stenches would drive away any but the most intrepid and the most impassable explorer. The title of ■this stupid yet in some respects mischievous book is shocking. Possibly it would be held as blasphemous under the common law." The Chicago News says : — " Mr. Stead has grasped all the virtues and •evils of our municipal and i^ublic life, and mastered not a few. It will be said that he has given the world nothing new, but that only shows that we are possessed of an indifference nothing short of criminal. There is not a person in this wonderful city possessing the average quota of observing power that does not know of the existence of every evil pointed out in Mr. Stead's book." The Advance (Congregationalist) says : — " No man ever worked more ■assiduously than did Mr. Stead during the four months which he spent in 2/8 Appendix. the city. He possesses an extraordinary faculty for getting at the facts in a case. A more strikingly unselfish man it would not be easy to find. Id his convictions, sympatliies, and aims it must be admitted that he is intensely Christian. Surely it will be wiser to consider the facts and heed the message than it would be to stop and throw sticks and stones at the messenger." The Interior (Presbyterian) keeps up the reputation of the religious press for " envy, malice, and all uncharitableness," by the following description of the black list, exposing the owners of houses of ill-fame, which no one else dared to publish : — "Mr. Stead has signalised his departure by leaving for publication a guide-book to the brothels and other places of evil resort in Cliicago. It is filled with the pious nastiness and abuse of the Church and of lespectable people out of which he manufactures liis sensations. The ver}" worst that can be sn'd of Cliicago is tliat sucli a man made his way into Church circles and attraci. d public attention." The Ram's Horn (Chicago) says : — " Mr. Stead s shocking revelation is more dreadful because there is incontestable eviilence of its trutii. Mr. Stead's in- vestigations have been conducted by the aiil of the best detective and legal help, and denials will be met with afSdavit and proof. Mr. Stead s Chicago visit has borne immediate fruit in the stimulation to heartier appreciation of the privileges and duties of Christian citizenship." The jReligio-PhilosopMcal Journal (Chicago) says : — " None but an expe- rienced and thoroughly-equipped jouriialist, familiar with all tlie modern methods of obtaining facts, could have written a book like this with regard to a great city after only a few weeks' residence in it. So far as we can judge, the information in it is accurate. Leading Chicago dailies have abused Mr. Stead for writing this book, but a more sensible course would be to thank him, and use tiieir influence in correcting as far as possible the bad condition of things." The Israelite (Chicago) says: — -"Tlie great trouble with Mr. Stead is that he is in earnest. He wants to apply practically the precepts which are enunciated every week from the Cliristian pulpits of the world. This does not suit the average Christian, and the same is just as true of the Jew. It is refreshing to see a man who means and trii s to elevate the world. The only reward tliat he will receive in his own time will be abuse and ridicule, and his detractors will be largely recruited from the ranks of the ministers of the Gospel, and all because he wants jaeople to live according to tlie teachings of Christ.' The Union Signal (Chicago) any s: — "The book is having just the effect the author intended. It is rousing tlie ire of the public, and especially, as is natural, of the Chicago public. For obvious reasons tlie book is denounced by the bum and boodle element, and for reasons not so obvious it seems to be stigmatised as pernicious by the moral and Christian element. The shame of it is not that sucli rottenness should be published, but that it should be possible for it to exist." The Altruistic Eeinew publislies a long character-sketch of the book, which it says liaunts the memory with the perpetual question, "What would Christ think ? " at every turn. The I^orth Western Christian Advocate says: — "The book is a clean cut and very plain statement of the civic and social evils of Chicago. Much Appendix. 279 that he describes is of such a hideous character that it ought to lead to the reform of the city." The 'New York World published a sixteen-column review and summary of the book. It says: — "The book is a startling rd'sum^ of Chicago life — social, industrial, political, and religious. Existing evils are exposed fearlessly, and the chief abettors are named without regard to persons or consequences. Of its kind it is the most sensational book of the decade. The striking cover of this dynamite-laden book, soon to be exploded in the hardened heart of Chicago, bears the figure of Christ, with one hand raised in rebuke against a half-score of typical Chicagoans who have just risen from the gambling table, their arms laden with gold." The Publisher, Boolseller and Stationer of New York says : — " There are many statements that appear to be true, but unfortunately some of them are truths which would better be left unspoken." The New Yorh Voice says : — " We know nothing so remedial as light, and while Mr. Stead himself is still something of an enigma to us, we believe in the imperative necessity of this sort of work. To turn on the light, and to keep it turned on, is a civic duty ( f surpassing importance. For one, wo thank Mr. Stead, and invite his attention to a city called New York." The Cincinnati Enquirer says : — " The book gives in pointed, bristling English Chicago life. It pictures what Christ would see if He came here. He has spared neither the rich nor influential." The Neios of St. Paul says : — " The book will cause something in the nature of a social earthquake, not only in Chicago, but throughout the country. The subjects he has treated in a way conducive to moral health, though a stinging assault upon proud hypocrisy." The Bochester Herald says : — " If Editor Stead is a crank, he is unquestion- ably a clever one. His indictment is a terrible picture of the worst phases of life in that magniiicent city. It seems to us that many who differ with him widely, who do not by any means endorse all bis extravagant statements, can read his book with profit, believing in the author's sincerity." The St. Louis Republican says:— "The book will do a little and temporary good, as a well-drawn caricature generally does. Mr. Stead gives us no remedy. He could not tell how to change the natures of the idle and the vicious, or how to ship them to some other clime. He performs the easy task of slandering the city by describing its faults and essential characteristics." The Minneapolis Journal says: — "The book does not justify the malevo- lence of Editor Stead's critics. If Mr. Stead has dared to paint a vivid picture of Chicago, Chicago ought not to be angry for having her plague- spots disclosed by an English censor. Mr. Stead prints little second-hand information. He went down into the slimy, odorous depths and saw for himself. He has produced a study which cannot fail to be of service to all genuine philanthropists and reformers. What Mr. Stead says about the despotism and lawlessness of the police not only is true to the letter, but ia a burning disgrace to most of our American cities, where public sentiment, if it exists against flagrant abuses, is afraid to assert itself." The Philadelphia Press says : — " The book will prove to be a revelation as well as a rude shock to thousands who have forgotten God in their pursuit of 28o Appendix. gain. It is well and strongly written, and shows in every chapter its truth and the deep earnestness of its author. Many will denounce the hook while marvelling at its truth, and it will be read all the same until the story of Chicago's shame passes into history." The Detroit Free Press says : — " The book has been condemned on the score of the immorality it treats of, but the work is clean. It is fearless, and shows the putridity existing in all large social sybtems. The book is worth reading, and suggests thoughts which should result in action." The Cleveland Citizen says : — " This thought-creating work is a terrible indictment of the capitalistic system. Chicago is only doing on a large scale what Cleveland is doing on a t mailer scale. Probably not seven of our twenty councilmen have clean hands. There is hardly a saloon-keeper, gambler, or keeper of a house of ill-fame that is exempt from paying black- mail in one form or another. The whole social system is rotten to the core." The Spohaiie JReview (Wash.) says : — " The book will supply matter for thousands of speeches by agitators and reformers. It is a picture of Chicago printed in vivid and virile language. If it succeed in awakening greater interest in much-needed reforms, Mr. Stead will have accomplished a great work and will deserve the thanks of generations yet to come." The Indianapolis News says : — " Mr. Stead's book is wonderfully compre- hensive, and although he is inclined to see the worst, he has written from general observation, and his tone is indisputably fair. Probably no one will dispute his facts." The Washington Star says : — " The book represents an enormous amount of original investigation, and is of greater value to the student of municipal methods than any other publication known to book readers ; the whole field seems to have been thoroughly and deeply ploughed, and it will be surprising if improvement of the crop does not soon result." The Colorado Gazette says : — " The book is awful and disgusting, but it is true, and its description is not overdrawn. We acknowledge that Mr. Stead is thoroughly in earnest, that he has written from good motives, that he has been perfectly fearless, and so far as potsible perfectly fair. It is a book which it is thoroughly worth while seriously-minded adult persons to read and to ponder over when they read." The Toronto Mail says : — " The strength of the book lies in the truthful- ness of it. Mr. Stead's statements will be in some cases denied, but there is no doubt that some of them will receive corroboration even in the city of which he writes. The police system is said to be hopelessly corrupt and inefficient, and the pestilential dirt of the city of a nature to be deeply alarmed about." The Toronto Week, in a lengthy review of the book, says : — " There are not many men in England who could write as Mr. Stead has done. The justification of the book is its truthfulness. We have not found a base insinuation in a single line. We do not see how the general conscience of Christendom is to be awakened to a sense of its great i-esponsibilities and corresponding privileges save by just such exposures." The Toronto Evening News says: — " No book has appeared for five years -at once so startling and so revolutionary, written in plain Anglo-Saxon so as to reveal clear-cut the naked truth." Appendix. 281 THE PRESS IN GREAT BRITAIN. The World says : — " In jMr. Stead's pitiless and extraordinarily powerful examination of Chicago life by the search-light of Christian ethics, he practically arraigns the ideals, the aims, the methods, the entire social and moral economy of that great Western Republic which vaunts itself as the pioneer of democratic liberty and progress. We recognise the extreme value as well as the amazing force of his latest and certainly most brilliant achieve- ment. The value of his book consists in its splendidly-marshalled array of evidences of the all-pervading corruption, the licensed perjury, the municipal incompetence, the squalid tyranny that dominate this free, glorious, and outwardly prosperous cftadel of a young and unfettered democracy. It is easy to forgive the author of ' If Christ Came to Chicago ' his faults of taste, his calculated sensationalism, and his occasionally wild riding of a hobby that has run away with him ere this, for the sake of his marvellously vivid and minutely-finished picture of the state of society evolved from the exalted New- World theories of liberty, equality, and independence." The Investor^ Review says : — " We may at once say, however, that the book is well worth reading in spite of its title and in spite of the tabooed subjects it in part treats of. The title is in some respects the worst thing about it, for whatever have we to do with the purely Semitic views of social economy enunciated in their greatest perfection by Jesus Christ ? Apart from this point we have no ill word to say about his vigorous attack on the social abuses in the United States. . . . The coiTuptions he speaks of are there, and they are a warning to those people in the United States who are clean- handed, and sane, and honourable, that they had better be up and doing if they are to save society from shipwreck, the State from disruption. To the English investor the picture here presented of two millions of people held fust in the grasp of a few dozens of scoundrels, without serious effort to release themselves — of a people neglected and despised by those who should be their leaders — is full of evil poitent. If the darkness now felt is not that which precedes the better day of awakened public spirit, of revived honesty in public affairs, the immediate future of the union is a future of decay, dissolution, and despair." The Daily Chronicle says : — " Mr. Stead has left his mark upon Chicago. It can be no exaggeration to say that the moat prosperous city in the United States cannot continue to be quite the same, since his visit, as it was before. It canuot fail to be epoch-making in the history of the city. This little book is thoroughly characteristic of the small weaknesses and the great strength of its writer. As a fearless and faithful study of a single example of modern social, political, and industrial organisation, it is without a rival." Tlie Times says : — " In spite of its tone of dogmatic infallibility and its mauy lapses of taste, Mr. Stead's work is not ill-calculated to attract and interest many readers. The work consists of two parts — on the one hand, a ecathing survey of the actual condition of Chicago, its municipal corriiption, its unabashed worship of wealth, its misery and its vice ; and, on the other, an impassioned appeal to its inhabitants to regard their municipality as the Church of the future and to ' run it,' as perhaps Mr. Stead would say himself, in the true spirit of Christian fellowship. It is written vigorously, though with too frequent a condescension to the style of ' the New Journalism,' and it is evidently based on close observation and very painstaking inquiry." The Daily News says: — "Th3 section of Mr. Stead's book, entitled 'If 282 Appendix. Christ Came to Chicago,' which treats of ' The Brotherhood of Labour,' lias acquired an a Iditional interest since its recent publication, both bf cause it furnishes particulars of the American trades organizations, and becRuse it surveys the question from the very scene of the strike riots which have given so great a shock to tlic civilized world. One passage, indeed, wears, in the light of the terrible events of the last few days, almost a prophetic air." The Fall Mall Gazette says :— " We may sura up the book as a brilliant piece of ' special ' work in a stylo that rec;ills the Amateur Casual and General Booth, bearing tlie marks of some highly unpleasant investigation au'l much patient labour. Wealth has subjugated everything in Cliicago, if we are to believe Mr. Stead. Wliat we now want to see is the other side of the shield. Mr. Stead is a master iu the art of creating sensations that good may come, and of such is this book. But one r'ses from tlie hastiest perusal wil;h the feeling that there is t x) much red and black in the picture. Surely, even Chicago cannot be quite so black as slie is here painted." The Fclio says : — " Mr. W. T. Stead's book on Chicago is so many-sided that it can liarclly fail to attain much popularity iu England. A syndicate of aristocratic Tories might find it worth while to promote its circulation as a counterblast to Mr. Andrew Carnegie's 'Triumphant Democracy.' The Social Purity Alliance might use it as an argument against government by police. Tlic Liberty and Property Defence League will find in it some useful warnings against unbridled democracy. Enemies of Home Kule could show from the book what might be expected if an Irish Parliament sat on College Green. Ardent Protestants might draw therefrom not a few plausible pretests for fighting the Churcli of Rome at every point. Socialists of every grade will see in it new arguments again.^t the almost omnipotent tyranny of capitalism. Meanwhile we must warn people with queasy stomachs and complacently optimist views not to touch the book at all." Emjland says : — " The book gives a pretty complete sketch, superficial it may be, but thorough as far as it goes, of tlie seamy side of Chicago. We welcome the book for the lurid light whicli it sheds upon the conduct of public affairs in Chicago, which no doubt fairly reflects the general standard of society all over America. Coming from the pun of so pronounced and militant a democrat, the book, which is well and graphically written, has a peculiar value." The National Ohseroer says : — " Never perhaps has the uninviting work of moral sanitary inspection been conducted with such zealous completeness. Whatever be his motives, Mr. Stead is entitled at least to the credit of having done liis work fearlessly and without reserve. He went forth to see the dark side of Chicago life, and he leaves no doubt but that he has seen it, and seen it whole. Mr. Stead has performed his self-imposed task with his wonted ability and somewhat more than his wonted audacity." The Speaker says: — "If, as Mr. Benjamin Kidd tells us, the most salient feature of our social evolution is the growth of altruism, then its ultimate outcome ought to be that civic religion which is preached in Mr. Stead's remarkable book. Evidently it is not easy to practise civic religion unless you mingle with a etrenuous purpose a robust strain of tolerance. Mere preaching would not have helped Mr. Stead to collect the material for this book. A sense of ungoiiliness without an appreciation of hiunour would not have begotten a fellowship with a perfect jewel of electioneering 'bosses' iu the person of Farmer Jones. If Mr. Stead hi:id done nothing but discover Appendix. 283. Farmer Jones, he would have onricheil both the wisiloni and the gaiety of nations." The Morning Adcertlubted thut It wil , at least, greatly ai.l ia deepeu- k m our civic life is a most serious one." "••., Stead is perfectly fearless. He does "en into the very darV—- ' - huml''' ■ '■ LONDON: rniNTED BY WILLIAM CLOVrE? AND SONS, Limited-. STAJIFOr.D STREET AND CHAr.IXG CROSS. T«E EviEiy Of REyiEm (Edited by W. T. STEAD) 'ts/ief/ aji ,1... "' P°st free for r, '"""'^^'i'--w.' ,..,v; '°r 12 months t« „ the World for 8s ,d ' "^'"^ >y post 5s. 'ed'., Vest? .'■P-- ■- boofe are l,a„„ , '" P'"'"* '*Si^K^u..uw } fOTH THOUSAND. « !!ea for the union of all who lo n the service of all who suffer. LOV^ By W. T. STEAD. ^aid Vfu'i^f <>tir I in cloth, gilt, price HALF-A-CRl Found in paper covers, price ONE SHJ