Page:Fagan (1908) Confessions of a railroad signalman.djvu/90

72 preventable accidents, the casualty lists on our railroads would very quickly assume microscopic proportions. An “Employees’ Liability Act” would, of course, be looked upon as an absurdity; yet if unprejudiced judges were to analyze a few of our accidents, they would quickly conclude that the idea is sanely and soberly logical. They would simply consider the matter in the light of fair and square taxation with unmistakable and ample representation. It must not be forgotten that the manifestation of power by railroad labor is to be looked for not so much in the wording of schedules and agreements as in what the managements of railroads under pressure feel constrained to refrain from doing. The fairness and cogency of this argument may not “be as deep as a well” nor “as wide as a church door,” but I think, in the words of Mercutio, “’t is enough.” The questions and considerations that arise in this way in regard to the interests of the public, the management, and the men, are all comprehensively included and can be profitably discussed under the simple caption of loyalty,—on the one hand, loyalty of the men to their employers, and, on the other, loyalty of the employers to the men.

No sincere well-wisher of the railroad employee will question the importance of the relation that exists, or that is supposed to exist, on American