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314 VIOLENCE AND THE LABOR MOVEMENT
merce in violence. But he who is curious to pursue the
study further will find a list of references at the end of
the volume directing him to some of the sources of information.
(46) He will there discover an appalling record
of crime, for, as Thomas Beet points out, hardly a
strike occurs where these special officers are not sent to
make trouble. There are sometimes thousands of them
at work, and, if one undertook to go into the various
trials that have arisen as a result of labor disputes, one
could prepare a long
list
"hireling
assassins."
of murders committed by these
The pecuniary interest of the detective agencies in
provoking crime is immense. It is obvious enough, if
one will but think of it, that these detective agencies
depend for their profit on the existence, the extension,
and the promotion of criminal operations. The more that
people are frightened by the prospect of danger to their
property or menace to their lives, the more they seek
the aid of detectives. Nothing proves so advantageous to
detectives as epidemics of strikes and even of robberies
and murders. The heyday of their prosperity comes in
that moment when assaults
upon men and property are
most frequent. Nothing would seem to be clearer, then,
than that it is to the interest of these agencies to create
alarm, to arouse terror, and, through these means, to
When a trade or profession has
enlarge their patronage.
not only every pecuniary incentive to create trouble, but
when it is also largely promoted by notorious criminals
and other vicious elements, the amount of mischief that is
certain to result from the combination may well exceed
the powers of imagination.
And it must not be forgotten that this trade has developed
into a great and growing business, actuated by
exactly the same economic interests as any other business.