The strikers were fined $50 each, except the
president of the society, who was fined $150. After the trial
there was held a mass meeting which was attended, according to
the "Evening Post," by twenty-seven thousand persons. Resolutions
were passed declaring that "to all acts of tyranny and injustice,
resistance is just and therefore necessary," and "that the
construction given to the law in the case of the journeymen
tailors is not only ridiculous and weak in practice but unjust in
principle and subversive of the rights and liberties of American
citizens." The town was placarded with "coffin" handbills, a
practice not uncommon in those days.
Enclosed in a device representing a coffin were these words:
"THE RICH AGAINST THE POOR!
"Twenty of your brethren have been found guilty for presuming to
resist a reduction in their wages!.... Judge Edwards has
charged...the Rich are the only judges of the wants of the
poor. On Monday, June 6, 1836, the Freemen are to receive their
sentence, to gratify the hellish appetites of aristocracy!....
Go! Go! Go! Every Freeman, every Workingman, and hear the
melancholy sound of the earth on the Coffin of Equality. Let the
Court Room, the City-hall--yea, the whole Park, be filled with
mourners! But remember, offer no violence to Judge Edwards! Bend
meekly and receive the chains wherewith you are to be bound! Keep
the peace! Above all things, keep the peace!"
The "Evening Post" concludes a long account of the affair by
calling attention to the fact that the Trades' Union was not
composed of "only foreigners.
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