The agreement which was made with the producers was shown before Congress.[287] The producers were bound for a year from November 1, 1887, "to produce at least 17,500 barrels of crude petroleum less per day," and to make it, if possible, "30,000 barrels less per day." In return for this the oil combination agreed to give the speculative profits on 6,000,000 barrels of oil--the profits on 5,000,000 for them, and on 1,000,000 for their laborers. This move of those who want petroleum cheap to make it dear is one of the equivocations of policy in which princes have always distinguished themselves. The need of the hour was to stop the building of the competing pipe line. That was accomplished by the scheme of the shut-down, which amused the producers, and, as subsequent prices proved, did not hurt the buyer of their oil; quite the contrary. Drills and pumps at once ceased their operations throughout the oil regions. Working-men were thrown out of employment, stores were closed, hundreds of families had to subsist on charity. One of the Broadway producers who made this bargain for the shut-down admitted to the committee of the New York Legislature that "the oil-producing interest was abnormally depressed," and "that there was great distress."[288] The agreement itself recites that the price of petroleum had been during the preceding year "largely below the cost at which it was produced." The people of the oil country went to work with desperation to enforce the policy of oil famine. Committees were formed among the well-drillers in each district, "whose duty," the formal papers of organization stated, "shall be to keep a lookout for and endeavor to prevent the drilling of wells." "We have no way of stopping those who want to drill wells," one of the officers of the organization said, "only by good, reasonable talk." The Well-drillers' Union appointed and paid one of their members to reason with people who insisted upon digging wells. It is not necessary to question the good faith of the assurance their officials gave Congress that his duties did not require the use of nitro-glycerine. But, "unofficially," nitro-glycerine was freely used to enforce the shut-down. Men who failed to feel the influence of the "good talk," and went on putting up machinery, and drilling wells, would find their derricks blown into kindling-wood. Referring to one of these occurrences, a member of the Well-drillers' Union told Congress it was a case where no permission had been granted by the union to drill. "Was the rig destroyed?" he was asked. "The derrick was blowed up by some kind of compound." The quantity of the "compound" was enough to shake windows six miles distant. The derrick and the machinery were "cheapened" into junk. "Did you ever know of a case of any man's derrick and apparatus being blown up in the oil region before the formation of this association?" one of the shut-downers was asked. "I could not say that I do."[289]