Some men, when the labor epidemic strikes their places,
have sufficient force of character and influence with their men to
avert the blow for some time. Others find it is policy to compromise
with the representatives until a plan of action, conciliatory,
offensive, or defensive, can be determined upon. The whole matter must
be considered one of policy rather than of principles. The class of
men to be dealt with do not talk principles except as an excuse to
secure their ends.

In spite of everything, there will be times when no compromise is
possible and you will be called upon to take part in defending your
employers' interests against what is called a "strike." You can do so
with heart when you know the employes are all well paid, and
particularly, as is frequently the case, when the labor organizers and
walking delegates claim that some old, tried foreman shall be
dismissed because they do like him, really because he has not been a
tool in carrying out their plans, and they defiantly acknowledge that
their war is against non-union labor, and that they have organized
your men and forced a strike to require your establishment to become
as it is called a "union shop." If your deluded employes were
permitted simply to go away and let you alone, and you were permitted
to employ others at the reasonable wages you were paying, the problem
would be a simple one. The principal labor organizations claim that
everything they do is by peaceable methods, but this, like many things
said, is simply to deceive, for if you attempt to employ other
assistants and carry on your business independently, you will surely
find that well known roughs are assembled who never do anything
without they are paid for it by somebody, that your men are assaulted
by such persons, and while the labor organizers talk about peaceable
methods and urge them aloud in public, in case one of the roughs is
arrested, the loud talkers are the first to go bail for the defender,
and you will feel morally sure that the sympathizing crowd with the
roughs who make the assaults are all part of or tools of the
organization.

At such times, you will find your old employes standing around the
street corners, persuading other men not to go to work and thus
interfere with what are called the true interests of labor. Any new
employe who has to go in the street will be first met with inducements
of other employment, with offers of money, afterward with threats,
and, if opp