434 RELIGIOUS INFLUENCE: SOCIAL 



two years before. They sent their committee to Washington, the 

 headquarters of the system, and laid their demands before the 

 manager. Their demands were made in a dignified and gentlemanly 

 manner. The men were told they would be carefully considered 

 and every interest canvassed and a decision given them at such a 

 time. When the time arrived for the decision, the management 

 laid before the men, through their committee, an itemized statement 

 of the expense of the road for the past few years, the loss which it 

 had sustained in freight and loss in passenger traffic, in fact, all 

 the financial and industrial conditions of the whole system. This 

 statement was drawn up in a fair, just, and dignified manner and 

 submitted to the committee of the employees. After many con- 

 ferences, to which the officers of the different brotherhoods of the 

 railway employees were admitted, the whole matter was peaceably 

 and amicably settled to the satisfaction of all parties. And the men 

 went home to work with a new dignity added to their characters 

 the dignity of men who had been treated honorably, justly, and 

 fairly. And the manager who had conducted the whole affair went 

 to his home that night with a new dignity added to his character 

 a dignity which results from manly action." 



Not all questions of labor are to be settled by conferences and 

 conciliation. Arbitration comes next. 



This is a method growing in favor. It has been practiced suc- 

 cessfully for many years in England, and it is growing in favor in 

 the United States. The great coal strike in the anthracite coal 

 region of Pennsylvania is a case in point, where infinitely worse 

 possible damages were prevented by arbitration. Some things can- 

 not be arbitrated. No employer should demand that a man leave 

 his organization. No laborer should demand that only union men 

 be employed. When arbitration fails we should invoke the majesty 

 of the law. If there is no adequate law, then appeal to legislation. 

 We must look to these: " Conciliation, the recognition by employer 

 and employed that they are partners in a common enterprise; arbitra- 

 tion, the adjustment of all questions of self-interest, that cannot be 

 adjusted through conciliation, by reference to a properly chosen tri- 

 bunal; and the intervention of law when public rights are infringed 

 upon by controversy between labor and capital. 



" This seems to me to be the method of Jesus for the solution of the 

 labor war until we come to the recognition of the fact that workmen 

 and capitalists are partners in a common enterprise, and the very 

 motive of war ceases to exist." (Abbott.) 



Again we find the best modern charity is in the direction of the 

 teaching of Jesus. In the Old Testament there are numerous 

 passages showing the teaching of the Jewish nation concerning the 

 poor. In the Psalms: " Blessed is he that considereth the poor." 



