When a riot is running through a city there can be no neutrals; every — Scranton general strike

"The general public opinion, as expressed to me, seems not to apprehend any violence or danger unless a too free use of liquor shall be indulged in; and at the request of committees of the workingmans organizations and others, who have called upon me this morning, requesting me to close all places where liquor is sold. I, therefore, in compliance with said request, ask of you to close your bars, and to strictly abstain from the selling of all kind of liquor for the present."

"The boys of the firing squad and members of the Citizens Corps, had hardly been relieved from immediate duty by the arrival of Gen. Brinton and his command, when we found that we had to answer at the bar of public opinion, for what we thought had been both courageously and patriotically done."

"Whereas, we, the employees of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad Company, believe that we are not getting a just remuneration for our labor or a sufficient supply for ourselves and families of the common necessaries of life, therefore Resolved, That we demand twenty-five pet cent. advance on the present rate of wages; also it is further Resolved, That with a refusal of these demands all work will be abandoned from date, as we have willingly submitted to the reduction and without murmur or resistance and finding that it now fails us to live as becomes citizens of a civilized Nation we take these steps in order to supply ourselves and little ones with the neccesaries of life."

"It must be plain to you from the evidence, that this was no peaceful meeting of men for peaceful ends in Scranton on the 1st of August. If it were so, there was and could be no riot. On the contrary, it was an unlawful assemblage, destructive in its tendency, deadly in its purposes. It was a riotous meeting, and every man was a rioter who refused to help to quell it."