The Receiver Cut Their Pay 2 Cents an Hour. A Judge Made Him Put It Back.

The example set by Judge Caldwell, of the United States circuit court, in restoring the wages of Union Pacific employees, which had been arbitrarily cut by the receivers without notice to or consent of the employees themselves, was followed yesterday by Judge Langley, of the superior court, in restoring the wages of the conductors and motormen on the Rainier Avenue Electric line, which had been summarily cut from 20 cents to 18 cents per hour by Receiver W. J. Grambs. This action by Grambs had been taken after a conference between him and other street railway managers, and was followed by similar reductions on the Union Trunk line, the Consolidated Street Railway lines and the Third Street electric line, the two latter roads being in charge of Receiver J. S. Backus, who also made the reductions summarily. In these last two cases the employees also intend protesting in court against the reduction.

The petition of the Rainier Avenue Electric Railway employees granted yesterday by Judge Langley set forth that many of them had worked for the company ever since the building of the road. They had been induced to enter the company's employ by an agreement to lay off houses and lots in Columbia City and to pay for the same by installments withheld from their wages. Most of them have families, and they have faithfully served the company, as evidence of this citing the fact that there has never been an accident or a suit for damages brought against the company by reason of any neglect on their part, and also the fact that, although their wages had been withheld for several months, until there was an average of $150 due to each man, because of the chaotic condition of the affairs of the road, due to the absence from the city of J. K. Edmiston, the owner, and notwithstanding that their families had often suffered severely from want, they had remained at their posts and faithfully and carefully served the company. They had been receiving 20 cents an hour for an average of nine hours a day, when on April 2 Receiver Grambs cut their pay to 18 cents an hour, or $1.62 per day, which they complained was an unreasonably low rate of wages, upon which they could not decently live.

On the trial of the case the receiver was represented by Judge Burke, while Donworth & Howe appeared for the employees. The receiver offered testimony and affidavits from many street railway managers on the coast to show that 18 cents an hour was not less than the current rate of wages paid on the coast, one of the affidavits being from Salem, Or., where the rate of wages paid is 16 cents an hour. E. T. Wittier, general manager of the Union Trunk line, admitted that 16 cents an hour was too low a rate of wages for men to live decently, and that he would not offer such a rate of wages to his men, who work on an average eleven hours a day. It was also testified that the whole amount to be saved to the company by the reduction was only $50 a month.

Counsel for the employees cited numerous authorities to show that the operation of a corporation by the court should be in the interest of the public and not in the interest of the creditors, and he frequently alluded to the recent rulings of Judge Caldwell in the Union Pacific case. He said that it was getting to be one of the scandals of the day that receivers appointed at exorbitant salaries had arbitrarily cut the wages of employees. He said that if the criterion was to be not what the labor of a man is worth, but what under stress of circumstances men could be found to do the work for, men could be found to preside over courts of justice who would be willing to serve for less than judges now receive.

Judge Burke's argument was very brief, and was to the effect that he had never before heard the proposition urged in court that any one had a right to levy a forced contribution upon another man's property in order to maintain a high rate of wages. He said the present case was different from the Union Pacific case, wherein Judge Caldwell ruled that it would be inequitable to cut down the wages of the employees in order that the stockholders' profits could be maintained, whereas in this case the road was not earning its running expenses.

Judge Langley said that the receiver's conduct had been commendable in the main and his motives were proper, but when it came to so serious a matter as cutting the wages of the employees he should have presented the matter to the court whenever he discovered that the men were not willing to submit to the reduction. The conference between the receiver and other railway superintendents had been fair, but it was not his duty to make rates of wages as the result of such a conference. His duty ended when he got the information, by advising the court of what he had learned. He should not have used the information he had gained as the basis for an arbitrary action of his own. The receiver is simply the means by which the court manages the property. His duty is first to inform himself and then to inform the court. The receiver acts under the court and not the reverse, and he erred in making the reduction without the sanction of the court.

As to the reasonableness of the wages, the court said that no witness had said 18 cents an hour was a high rate. The rates prevalent in other cities could not be justly appreciated because the circumstances under which they had been put into use were not wholly stated. Perhaps every road, on account of the redundancy of idle men, could find men to run their roads at one-half to three-fourths of the present rate of wages. But these men would be working for an unreasonably low rate of wages. Many men would under stress of necessity work merely to keep soul and body together, accepting privation and suffering to their wives and children, but such circumstances should not be a precedent in court nor in commerce. The best interests of the community in general as well as those of the individual are better served by paying a decent wage than an unreasonable wage.

As the road was not paying its running expenses, the court said that those who furnished the money and put their property into the hands of the court were entitled to consideration. There was undoubtedly two sides to the question of the permanency of these investments. It was a speculation, and if these men made their fortunes, it was by that speculation. It had been a bad investment. They took their chances and assumed the hazard of losses. Those whose money created the enterprise took the risk that if the speculation turned out to be a profitable one the promoters would not have it all, and neither should they turn out to be losers if the speculation did not succeed. It was not their fault that the enterprise had failed, and they should not be turned out to receive honest wages.

He commended the spirit of the employees in applying to the court instead of striking, and said that if the arbitration of such differences were more common there would be fewer strikes. The prayer of the petitioners should be granted and the receiver ordered to restore the wages to what they were when he took charge of the property.

Judge Burke inquired how the deficiency in the expenses of the corporation was to be met, whether by the issue of receiver's certificates or other means, and the court said that the sooner the property was taken out of the hands of the receiver the better it would be, and intimated that perhaps the mortgagees would make up the difference. He would leave it to the attorneys to suggest the best means of meeting the difficulty.