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302
VIOLENCE AND THE LABOR MOVEMENT
crime To whose advantage was it to have disreputable
'deputies' do these things Why were only freight cars,
largely hospital wrecks, set on fire Why have the railroads
not yet recovered damages from Cook County,
Illinois, for failing to protect their property
. . .
The riots and incendiarism turned defeat into victory
for the railroads. They could have won in no other
way. They had everything to gain and the strikers everything
to lose. The violence was instigated in spite of
the strikers, and the report of the Commission proves
that they made every effort in their power to preserve
the peace." (36)
This history is important in a study
of the extensive
system of subsidized violence that has grown up in
America. Nearly every witness before the Commission
testified that the strikers again and again gave the police
valuable assistance in protecting the property of the
railroads.
No testimony was given that the workingmen
advocated violence or that union men assisted in the riots.
The ringleaders of all the serious outbreaks were notorious
toughs from Chicago's vicious sections, and they
were allowed to go for days unmolested by the deputy
marshals— who, although representatives of the United
States Government, were in the pay of the railroads.
In fact, the evidence all points to the one conclusion, that
the deputy marshals encouraged the violence of ruffians
and tried to provoke the violence of decent men by insulting,
drunken, and disreputable conduct. The strikers
realized that violence was fatal to their cause, and the
deputy marshals knew that violence meant victory for
the ailroads. And that proved to be the case.
B< fore leaving this phase of anarchy I want to refer
as briefly as possible to that series of fiercely fought
political and industrial battles that occurred in Colorado