"If now their (the courts) authority is to be weakened in a manner never known in the history of the jurisprudence of England or America, except in the constitution of Oklahoma, how can we expect that such statute will have efficient enforcement." It seems incredible that a man who held a position of Federal circuit judge for eight years, and who dealt with this very question should be ignorant of the fact that the English Parliament enacted a law, restraining chancery jurisdiction, and forbidding arrest, conviction or forfeiture without a jury. See 3 Edward II, A. D. 1309. In his work on Federal and State Constitutions (1908) Professor Stimson refers to this act of Parliament as "a principle only recently revived in the Constitution of Oklahoma." See page 14. Judge Taft was doubtless aware of the further fact that Sir Edward Coke sarcastically referred to the court of star chamber as "A court of criminal equity." The framers of the Oklahoma Constitution were not so original as you credit them with being, Judge Taft. Sincerely, WILBUR F. BRYANT. Taft the Father of Injunctions In 1892 Wm. H. Taft was appointed Judge of the United States Circuit Court in Ohio. Laboring men complained that in this office he "continually created anti-union precedents." Two cases are conspicuous in the memory of laboring men. One was known as the Arthur case, the other as the Phelan case. In 1893 the engineers of the Ann Arbor Railroad Company struck for higher wages. Engineers on connecting lines refused to handle cars from the Ann Arbor road, so long as the strike lasted. The Ann Arbor managers applied to Judge Taft for an injunction against P. M. Arthur, then Grand Chief of Engineers. Judge Taft issued the injunction and by mandatory order Mr. Arthur was required to rescind his order directing engineers on connecting roads not to handle Ann Arbor cars. At the same time Judge Taft declared that a rule which the Brotherhood of Engineers had adopted prohibiting engineers from handling freight from a road on which there was a strike was a conspiracy to commit a crime under the Federal Statutes. No member of the Engineers' Brotherhood was cited to appear and none was called as witness in the case before Judge Taft issued his decision. This was the first instance in the history of a writ of injunction where a party not originally a party to the proceedings and not a common carrier, and not either agent or servant of a common carrier, was held guilty of a crime. James Fox, then a noted New York newspaper man, referring to Judge Taft's decision, stated that it would "lead to the dispersion and forcible breaking up by court orders of every assemblage of workingmen, however innocent or lawful in their purpose, and to the nullification of all their agreements." In 1894 Judge Taft issued an order prohibiting F. W. Phelan from organizing the employes on the Cincinnati & Southern road. Phelan continued his work as an organizer and Judge Taft called him into court and sentenced him to six months in jail. One billion dollars and more were appropriated at this session of Congress to meet the reckless expenditures of the Government, and not one dollar or an hour's time has been honestly used to alleviate in the least the hard condition of the working people of this country.-Hon. Madison R. Smith of Missouri. May 30. 1908. MR. TAFT'S INJUNCTION DECISIONS. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers' Journal in 1893 At the time of the Arthur decisions, Mr. Arthur, well known at the most conservative labor leader in the United States, was editor of the Journal of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, published at Cleveland, Ohio. In the Journal for May, 1893, Mr. Arthur printed an editorial, from which the following extract is taken: "Judge Taft lays much stress upon the fact that, as Grand Chief of the B. of L. E., Mr. Arthur wields power beside which that of the autocrat of many a State is insignificant. It is true that as Grand Chief of the B. of L. E., Mr. Arthur has power, and it is solely by reason of the belief among the members of our Brotherhood that we have a common cause, and that as a leader he is best fitted to represent that cause before the world. It is true that even such power may be, as it too often has been, used for the injury of the people. But it has been wielded by Mr. Arthur for years, not merely without objections from any influential quarter, but with the greatest acceptance, even to Judges Ricks and Taft, the Ashleys and others who join with the above gentlemen in their denunciation at this time of what they term labor's autocratic power. For years at all prominent terminal railroad centers the B. of L. E. has had social fraternal gatherings, to which the most learned and able of jurists, governors, professional, political and civic gentlemen were invited. They laid aside the cares and duties of the office, home pleasures and engagements that they might by their presence and words assure not only the members of the B. of L. E., but the public, their appreciation of our efforts, also that they might be in touch with the humble citizen who six days out of seven have the care of the traveling public and millions of property in their hands. These gentlemen have at all times endeavored to impress vast congregations how thoroughly they were in accord with, and how highly they appreciated, the noble work we were as an association accomplishing. They have spoken in the highest terms of our leader, never failing to commend Mr. Arthur's conservative policy, which in the past has adjusted the many grievances between railway companies and their employes. Even eminent divines from the many denominations have laid aside their priestly robes and bidden Godspeed in our mission: We were assured by the press that we were engaged in a fealty for our fellow men worthy the highest efforts of noblemen. Judge Taft's decision publicly proclaims the members of the B. of L. E. a band of conspirators, and he endeavors to impress the public of its unfitness to judge of our standing. This has caused the public press, with few exceptions, to denounce our mode of protection, and it is but natural we should hesitate to pick up again the unfinished work which has claimed our attention for the past thirty years. We cannot accept Judge Taft's decision in any other 'ight than treason to republican institutions and the liberties of the eople. It is, will be, and ought to be, denounced and repudiated by all liberty loving men. If the decision stands as the decision of the highest tribunal of the land, it will be defied and violated by the highest earthly tribunal-the people. We believe the members of the B. of L. E and B. of L. P. are what is termed free American Citizens, whose loyalty to State has never been impeached, and we do not believe we can be deprived of the liberty vouchsafed to us by the constitution without due process of law. "FREEMEN IN BONDAGE." Frank P. Sargent in 1893 Said Judge Taft's Injunction Was "A New Fangled Relic Relied Upon to Reduce Railroad Trainmen to Machines to Do the Bidding of Masters With Authority Conferred by a United States Judge." In the issue of the North American Review of May, 1893, Mr. Frank P. Sargent contributed an article on the action of Judge Taft in issuing a crushing labor injunction. At the time Judge Taft rendered that decision, Mr. Sargent was Grand Master of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen. What Mr. Sargent really thought of the action of Judge Taft in 1893-and what every railroad man who opposes government by injunction to-day-may be seen by reading his article in the May, 1893, number of the North American Review. Mr. Sargent thus wrote then: "In the case of the strike on the Toledo, Ann Arbor and North Michigan railroad, which occurred on March 8th, every precaution was taken, and every movement on the part of the members of the order was deliberate and lawful. There was not an instance of insubordination; nothing turbulent or seditious. Men had appealed to their employers, like men, to have serious and grievous wrongs redressed in a manly way, as become good and law-abiding citizens. They had been over-worked and under-paid. Their employers had violated contracts and had subjected them to outrageous treatment, and mocked at their complaints. Their pleadings and protests had availed not, and when endurance and patience had ceased to be virtues, when all efforts to find redress had utterly failed, then, and only then, did they strike; only then did they assert their manhood, their rights as citizens and abandon their work, preferring idleness and the sacrifices which idleness entails to the degradation which injustice and insolence force upon the unresisting. "The strike on the Toledo, Ann Arbor and North Michigan railroad had no extraordinary features, but the interferences of the United States judges have given it national prominence, and if the dictum of these judges is to stand as the law, the dearest rights of the citizen are swept away and an autocracy is established. This view of the situation is not strained, but is strictly in consonance with the avowals of the press throughout the country. The questions of law involved are fundamental and are commanding, as they should command, the best thought of the nation. It has hitherto been conceded that railroad employes possessed all the rights as citizens which attached to the employers, that is to say, that if employers possessed the right to discharge employes, when it pleased them to exercise such authority, the employes also possessed the right, unchallenged, to quit work when they elected to exercise that right. If a judge of the United States court may abolish this right of an employe, he remands him, unequivocally, to a servitude as degrading as the Spartans imposed upon their helots, and it is this phase of the strike which has aroused such intense concern and alarm. "It will not be expected that I should enter upon a discussion of the legal points involved; at best I can only voice the sentiments of a body of law-abiding men who have been trained by their organizations to respect laws and the decisions of courts, and who find themselves suddenly reduced to the condition of peonage by the d cision of a United States judge. The learned judge, in his decision, finds it convenient to omit all reference to the duties of railroad magnates, and devotes all his attention to employes, intimating to them that, having sought employment upon railroads, they have become, by some legal hocus-pocus, a part of its machinery to remain during the pleasure of their employer. In handing down such a judicial opinion, the judge seeks to bury out of sight the inalienable right of a railroad employe to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. If an engineer, he is welded to the throttle of his engine; if a fireman, he can lay down his pick and scoop only when his master gives him permission. The interstate commerce law is invoked, it is true, and the whys and wherefores of the boycott are involved, but the judge, disdaining to be exact, gives employes to understand that once becoming engineers or firemen, they part with their rights as citizens and are links in a chain gang of railroad employes, because they are in some sense public servants, and the exercise of the prerogative to quit work is productive of inconvenience. But it will be observed that no reference is made to public needs of inconvenience, when an official, without notice or warning, at his own sweet pleasure, discharges an employe. "It has been suggested that a railroad employe, when he accepts service, enlists-something after the manner of a private soldier in the regular army of the United States-placing himself under the control of officers, from corporal to the commander of the company, regiment or division, and therefore can neither quit nor resign, but is held by some mysterious power recently discovered by a United States judge. True, it may be, that neither railroad men nor the public profess to understand clearly what the judge means, but the best efforts that have been made to comprehend his dec larations lead to the conclusion that they restrict the rights of employes and indefinitely enlarge the rights of the employers. For myself, I do not regret that a United States judge has forced upon public attention questions of such acknowledged gravity. The time has come for workingmen to know if they have rights which the courts are bound to respect, or if these rights may be at any time abrogated to meet the demands of corporations or the combined capitalistic power. The United States judge at Toledo has started the controversy, and I desire to have it proceed until the unquestioned rights of railroad employes, if rights they have, are established, as also the rights of their employers. "It is asserted that railroads become common carriers, but are unable to perform their obligations without men. They must have men, and it should be stated they must have engines, fuel, water, steam, tracks, etc. The locomotives and equipments can be purchased and become the property of the road, but they are useless without men, and these, once secured, the general manager, speaking as if by authority, intimates that they become fixtures, because without them, as without engines, the obligations of the railroads cannot be performed; such is the newfangled logic relied upon to reduce railroad trainmen to machines, to do the bidding of masters with authority conferred by a United States judge. In at least one notable instance a United States judge has shown his utter contempt for a sovereign state and the laws made in conformity with the constitution, and has sent county officials to prison because they would not disregard their oaths and obey his mandateand it will readily be conceded, if such a high-handed outrage can be perpetrated and the judge remain unimpeached, that a judge may, with equal impunity, subject railroad employes to autocratic indignities. Such acts on the part of judges may lead to a movement to define the limits of judicial power, since, if it is far-reaching as I have indicated, the demand to know the worst will grow in emphasis until worst is known, and the present is as favorable a period as will ever occur in the history of workingmen or of the country for adjustments and readjustments. "The language of the judge, it would be prudent to say, creates general alarm; like the phenomena that precede cyclones and earthquakes, it presages other troubles, compared with which the Toledo strike will be insignificant. "Fortunately, it is held that the court has assumed authority which it does not possess; that its dictum is extra-judicial; that it does not possess the authority to reduce men to machines or to a commodity; that rights acquired by revolution, war and legislation cannot be crushed and overwhelmed by a district judge at his pleasure. But it so happens that while men debate such propositions, embodying self-evident truths, the court, with an iron grip, holds freemen in bondage, and the victims are as powerless as when, under another exhibition of power, men were sold at the auction block. LABOR'S GRIEVANCES. An Official Statement of the Appeals Which the Federation of Labor Made to the President and to Congress-Most of the Appeals Fell on Deaf Ears. The Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor in March of this year sent the following petition to the President and the presiding officer of both houses of Congress: Hon. Theodore Roosevelt, Washington, D. C., March 21, 1906. President of the United States; Hon. Wm. P. Frye, President pro tempore, United States Senate; Hon. Joseph G. Cannon, Speaker House of Representatives, United States. Gentlemen: The undersigned executive council of the American Federation of Labor, and those accompanying us in the presentation of this document, submit to you the subject-matters of the grievances which the workmen of our country feel by reason of the indifferent position which the Congress of the United States has manifested toward the just, reasonable, and necessary measures which have been before it these past several years, and which particularly affect the interests of the working people, as well as by reason of the administrative acts of the executive branches of this Government and the legislation of the Congress relating to these interests. For convenience the matters of which we complain are briefly stated, and are as follows: The law commonly known as the "eight-hour law" has been found Ineffective and insufficient to accomplish the purpose of its designers and framers. Labor has, since 1894, urged the passage of a law so as to remedy the defects, and for its extension to all work done for or on behalf of the Government. Our efforts have been in vain. Without hearing of any kind granted to those who are the advocates of the eight hour law and principle, Congress passed and the President signed an appropriation bill containing a rider nullifying the eight hour law and principle in its application to the greatest public work ever undertaken by our Government, the construction of the Panama Canal. The eight-hour law in terms provides that those instrusted with the supervision of Government work shall neither require nor permit any violations thereof. The law has been grievously and frequently violated. The violations have been reported to the heads of several Departments, who have refused to take the necessary steps for its enforcement. While recognizing the necessity for the employment of inmates of our penal institutions so that they may be self-supporting, labor has urged in vain the enactment of a law that shall safeguard it from the competition of the labor of convicts. In the interest of all of our people and in consonance with their almost general demand, we have urged Congress for some tangible relief from the constantly growing evil of induced and undesirable immigration, but without result. Recognizing the danger of Chinese immigration and responsive to the demands of the people, Congress years ago enacted an effective Chinese-exclusion law, yet despite the experience of the people of our own country, as well as those of other countries, the present law is flagrantly violated, and now, by act of Congress, it is seriously proposed to invalidate that law and reverse the policy. The partial relief secured by the laws of 1895 and 1898, providing that seamen shall not be compelled to endure involuntary servitud has been seriously threatened at each succeeding Congress. The pe |