ect saat i i f yall “ a" f “ent "af pag pad bl et bso Fee ee pieaS fd ead “SP ie a - é Ff - pure 304 ce 4 ab 3 dts yy oenan st 4 Tie ee eg eSgo re 4 1 Chega sa a6, a esr HE ind viet fos ae ple eee THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY range ws , & a SF 4 y PCA é-7-ws Return this book on or before the Latest Date stamped below. A charge is made on all overdue books. U. of I. Library MAR -2'35 MAR3 #38 APR LS i949 | wOY § i939 OT om hat ee i inf ‘if * fy im e tH dims 5 : MAL 2? fs tf t{ a re Be OCT 2213 ates ae 6 Fiicz6 i" 8057-S aye el ry wei) y { > THE WORKERS’ LIBRARY HE WORKERS’ LIBRARY is a library in the making, em- bracing subjects and viewpoints developing out of the political and economic conditions since the World War and the Russian Revolution. Two cloth bound books, of which this volume is the second, the first being Trotsky’s “Dictatorship vs. Democracy,” and two pamphlets, “For a Labor Party” and “The American Foreign-Born Workers”, comprise the volumes so far published. We wish also to recommend the following list as of supreme importance to workers who wish to educate themselves so as to be able to take a progressive position in the class struggle. Cloth-Bound Books Dictatorship vs. Democracy, Leon Trotsky.............000 $1.00 Ancient Society, Lewis. H. Morgan... .....05..0..5 525 ene 1.50 Critique of Political Economy, Karl Marx..............6. 125 Essays on the Materialistic Conception of History, Antonio: Labriola i 5.2% esau ba siotie tlle als alae eee Rak by History of the U. S. Supreme Court, Gustavus Myers........ 2.50 Proletcult, Eden and Cedar’ Paulin. 2202 nn clone as 03 Se 1.50 Philosophical Essays, Joseph Dietzgen............:..+5008 1.50 Landmarks of Scientific Socialism, Friedrich Engels........ LZ Savage Survivals in Higher Peoples, J. Howard Moore...... 1:25 Pamphlets The American Foreign-Born Workers, C. S. Ware Class Struggles in America, A. M. Simons For a Labor Party, John Pepper The A. B. C. of Communism, Bucharin Bankruptcy of the American Labor Movement, Wm. Z. Foster The Railroaders’ Next Step—Amalgamation, Wm. Z. Foster The Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels The Communist Program, Bucharin The American Empire, Scott Nearing Imperialism, Lenin Address: Literature Department Workers Party or AMERICA 799 Broadway, New York City. WORKERS PARTY LIBRARY, Vol. 2 THE GOVERNMENT— STRIKEBREAKER A Study of the Role of the Government in the Recent Industrial Crisis By JAY LOVESTONE Published May 1, 1923 By the WORKERS PARTY OF AMERICA New York City Copyright, 1923, By the Workers Party or AMERICA Published May, 1923 9 cf ) 4 tT TR eT MA uJ : ay new a hs Yio thurs af. 2 sa a + - i», c: SYYV Yn te FOREWORD | Bh powerful forces making for a sharpening of the class struggle have been greatly intensified and brought into bold relief by the World War. The Great War lent considerable impetus to the development of a highly centralized Government and a homogeneous working class in America. This was ably pointed out for the first time by John Pepper, in his pamphlet, “For a Labor Party—Recent Revolutionary Changes in American Politics.” That these tendencies are developing at a rapid pace is borne out by an analysis of the recent industrial crisis and the role of the Government therein. The unity between the Stock Exchange in Wall Street and the White House in Washington is becoming ever more close and ever more open. On April 17, 1923, Judge Elbert H. Gary, Chief Executive of the United States Steel Corporation, scored the present Immigration Law and made an urgent plea for a superabundance of cheap labor power. The next day, President Harding, Chief Executive of the United States Government, echoed the Steel Baron’s opinions. How rapidly this centralized Governmental power of op- pressing the workers is growing! In 1919, the Government secured a sweeping injunction for the coal magnates on the basis of the Lever Act. In 1922 the Government, without the aid of even a formal law, secured a far more drastic injunction for the railway magnates. By the provisions of the McCumber- Fordney Tariff Act, the President is given the power to regulate tariff rates in utter violation of the Constitution. And by its decisions invalidating the Minimum Wage Law of the District of Columbia, the U. $. Supreme Court has decreed that the full military and judiciary powers of the Government shall be em- +) 578596 6 FOREWORD ployed for the legalization and perpetuation of starvation wages. What is more, the capitalists are now preparing a new drive against the workers. The employers are organizing to launch a fiercer Open Shop Drive. This struggle promises to be the main issue of the 1924 Election. Already Strikebreaker-General Daugherty and Brigadier-General Dawes have dedicated the Republican Party to the Open Shop movement. The workers are facing a crisis. They must act and act quickly. They must repel the new capitalist onslaught. The workers must do more than that. The workers must so organize themselves as to be able to turn their campaign of defense into a successful offensive that will shell the employing class out of its powerful political and industrial entrenchments. Too long have the militants in the American labor move- ment turned to other countries for their lessons and inspiration. Too long have the militants in the American labor movement neglected the struggles of their own working class. In the in- vestigation of our recent industrial crisis and the role of the Government therein, in the study of the class conflicts, and in the analysis of the conditions under which the giant industrial battles were fought, I have put my conclusions completely at the mercy of the facts. My policy was to resort to official authori- tative documents and figures, and to rely on the collation and regimentation of this data for establishing the conclusions. The object of this study is to present to the American workers the story of their recent heroic battles against employing class oppression in such a manner as to aid them in their new struggles for freedom. To the extent that this effort of mine helps the working class in achieving complete liberation from capitalist tyranny and exploitation, to that extent will the author consider his purpose attained. Jay LOvESTONE. New York, May 1, 1923. CONTENTS CHAPTER i II. iil. IV. VI. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE AGAINST THE WORKERS.... The Government’s Labor Policy During the War. “Wait Till the War Is Over.” The Reversion to Normalcy. The Gov- ernment in Its True Role. The Government Organizes Wholesale Raids on the Workers. The Open Shop Drive. Object of the Drive. The Open Shoppers at Work. Results. HEM GREAT DEPRESSION. ore stauie} sv ciste Sl aecres Heieses Depression Sets In. Deflation and Unemployment. Bitter- ness of the Struggle. Employers’ Profits in Depression. The Workers Lose. The Farmers and Soldiers Are Hard Hit. Wage Cuts Very Painful. Standards of Living. Readjust- ment Strikes of 1921. Capitalists United—Workers Divided. THE TExTILE WorKERS REVOLT...... mers 2 Lien Issues of the Strike. The Workers—Slaves. Their Living Conditions. The Workers Revolt. The Courts. The Military Forces. Burns Detective Agency Takes a Hand. Strike Settlements. The Unions and the Strike. Its Significance. THe Miners on StrRIKE—AN Army AT War....... Clearing the Ground. Breaking the Agreement. On the Eve of the Struggle. The Strike Begins. Another Com- parison. Wages and Working Conditions. Strike in Full Swing. Strike Deadly Effective. The Government Runs to the Rescue of the Operators. Harding Dons the Strike- breaker’s Uniform. Profiteering Rampant. Negotiating an Armed Truce. Significance of Strike. Bureaucratic Leaders Betray the Workers. Conclusion. Hrerrin—A Lesson 1n AMERICAN Ciass War...... Facts of the Case. Chorus of Revenge. The Indictments. A Challenge to Unionism. Brutal Class Justice. Lessons of the Conflict. THE Raitway SHop Crarts Faby in LINE........ Some Railroad History. Railroad Labor Board Steps In. The Shop Crafts Revolt. Railways Grow Richer and Work- ers Grow Poorer. Wages and Working Conditions. Strike Grips the Country. Service Crippled and Profits Cut. Government Rallies to the Open Shop Drive. Preparing the Settlements. Big Four Attempt Peace. Results of the Strike. 7 PAGE 9 27 50 74, 115 134 & CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE Vi. Vili. IX. XG XII. XIII. XIV. THE Courts AND THE WORKERS......... «i. aaa Role of Courts in Class Conflict. Courts Serve: the Rich. Courts Are Against the Workers. Supreme Court Leads the Attack on the Workers. Some Recent Decisions—The Duplex Case; The American Steel Foundries Case; Truax y. Corrigan; The Coronado Decision; Child Labor Decision. “GOVERNMENT BY INJUNCTION”..........0eeeeeees 214 Historical Background. Our First Injunctions. The Injunc- tion As a Weapon in Class Warfare. Daugherty Injunction. Provisions of the Injunction. Ravages of the Injunction. Capitalists Are Desperate. Conclusion. THE ARMY AND THE WORKERS.........ececeeeees 232 Against the Labor Organizations. In the Textile Strike. In Miners’ Strike. In the Railway Strike. Major General Harbord States Employers’ Policy. THE EMPLOYERS ASSOCIATIONS........j000+eeeeee 248 Main Purpose of These Organizations. Sriashine the Unions. The Open Shop in Action — A Capitalist Dictatorship. Breaking the Railway Strike. Wield Tremendous Power. THE Press Does :I1s “Birr. 1.5, \ sistemas hes « 274 The Press—A Servant of the Raplogie lace Preparing the Grand Offensive. Press Welcomes Labor Treason. Preaches Employing Class Solidarity at Herrin. In the Textile Strike. Mining and Railway Strikes. Undermining the Railway Strike. Workers Must Have Their Own Press. AmeErRIcAN DEmocracy—A Capitatist DictatorsHip 307 The Capitalist State. In the United States. Some History. Our Holy Constitution. An Underground Convention. The Venerable “Fathers”. Our Constitution Against the Masses. The Aristocracy of the Robe. Checks and Balances. The Committee System. Our Cabinet System. Our Party System. THE MEANING OF THE STRUGGLES AND THE OuTLOOK 329 Political Radicalization of the Working Masses. The 1922 Elections. The Trend Toward a Labor Party. Industrial Radicalization. The General Strike Resolution. Defending the Communist Workers. The Printers’ and the Maintenance of Way Workers’ Conventions. The Sweep of Amalgama- tion. The Trade Union Educational League Conference. The Capitalists Unite. The Gigantic Mergers. Stock Dividends Declared En Masse. The Government Is Prepar- ing. New Struggles Ahead. CONCLUSION THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER CHAPTER I. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE AGAINST THE WORKERS The Government's Labor Policy During the War. (y® participation in the World War had a beneficial effect on the trade unions. In the course of the war the membership of the American Federation of Labor doubled. The railway unions especially made great gains. They won a foothold on many systems which had previously refused to deal with them. In this phenomenal rise the organizations of the unskilled work- ers grew at a particularly rapid pace. The membership of the United Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees and Rail- way Shop Laborers rose to 325,000 in 1919. In 1920 the mem- bership of the International Seamen’s Union totalled 115,000. Many other industries that had previously successfully resisted unionization became strongly organized. The Government recognized the utter impossibility of winning the war without an effective mobilization of the labor forces. This knowledge on the part of the Government was in a large measure responsible for many gains made by the unions. Formal invitation to assure the accomplishment of this task was extended by the Government to the Railway Brotherhoods, the American Federation of Labor and many other labor bodies. This policy of the National Government was clearly expressed by the War Labor Board: 9 10 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER “The right of workers to organize in trade unions and to bargain collectively thru chosen representa- tives is recognized and affirmed. This right shall not be denied, abridged, or interfered with by the em- ployers in any manner whatsoever.”?) Speedy, unrestricted output in industry is today indispensable to a nation at war if it is to be saved from defeat. The Govern- ment found it easier to achieve this output by dealing with or- ganized workers who were directed and controlled by a conser- vative or reactionary leadership than by trusting to the undi- rected whims and wishes of a dissatisfied, unorganized mass of workers. The government was compelled by the sheer neces- sity of avoiding disaster during the war, to adopt this policy towards the unions. Besides, the successful prosecution of the war required Burgfrieden—class peace. When the United States entered the war the country was in the throes of great industrial unrest. In 1916 and 1917 there were reported by the Department of Labor 8,239 strikes and lockouts.2) The year 1917 was a record year of 4,324 strikes reported by the Department of Labor.) Contentment at home is also a condition prerequisite for attain- ing the end to which the Government subdued everything else —-victory in war. The Government was therefore compelled by political as well as economic conditions to adopt at least a seem- ingly non-hostile attitude towards the labor unions. “Wait Till the War Is Over.” The more conscious and far-sighted representatives of the capitalists, their political leaders and skilled diplomats saw in 1) Report of the Secretary of the National War Labor Board 1919, P2523: 2) Monthly Labor Review—June 1920, Vol. 10, No. 6, page 204, 3) Monthly Labor Review—May 1922, page 181. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE 1] the working-class revolution in Russia and the flames of war a menace to the whole capitalist fabric of exploitation and op- pression. These spokesmen of the employing class saw the need of subjecting everything else to the one end of a victory of Al- lied Imperialism—an end in which they could find their only hope for securing their system. In the interest of this greater aim, some ground was temporarily yielded to the workers. But the American capitalists only grudgingly and resentfully attuned themselves to this condition. They were whetting their knives for more blood. In the powerful conclaves of Wealth and Privilege the slogan was: “Wait Till the War Is Over.” The capitalists were marshalling their forces for the “grand offens- ive” against the working class. This campaign to crush the workers was somewhat delayed by the continuation of the war prosperity. But the capitalists lost no time.. Their Government, their press, and their detective agencies, were busily preparing the ground for a “fight to the finish.” The Reversion to Normalcy The declaration of the Armistice was a signal for an in- tensified labor struggle in the United States. For two years following the cessation of hostilities, America grappled with the problems of readjusting its machinery of production and ex- change to a peace basis. This readjustment has not yet been completed; if it ever will be. By the fall of 1920 we were well on our way to a peace basis. And with the return to “normalcy” the economic crisis in which America found itself on the eve of the World War gripped the United States more deadly than ever. The great depression began in the latter months of 1920. The year 1921 was the worst the United States had known. 12 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER But the reversion to “normalcy” also brought with it the greatest industrial crisis in our history—the overwhelming strike wave in 1922. Never before had the country witnessed such bit- ter class conflicts. ‘Textile workers, soft stone cutters, granite cutters, miners and railwaymen were the vanguard of the heroic army of resistance to the employers’ wage-cutting and union- smashing offensive. Never before in our industrial history have there been such large numbers on strike and never before have the workers remained out for such long periods. Out- wardly, these and the many other strikes appear only as disputes over wages or hours of labor. Fundamentally, the strikes of 1922 were far more significant. They were a revolt against the powerful campaign waged by the captains of finance and industry to uproot every vestige of working-class organization. The strikers fought these battles primarily to uphold these organizations which they had built up thru years of painful struggle. The Government in Its True Role Many workers maintain that the Government is the cen- tralized, directing organ of capitalist oppression—the executive committee of the employing class. The history of the “grand offensive” against the workers, the great Open-Shop drive of 1920 completely bears out this truth. By means of its policy of repression in the Steel and Mine Strikes of 1919 and the vicious “Red Raids” of 1920 the Government prepared the ground for the country-wide attack on the working class. In the Steel Strike troops were freely put at the disposal of the mill owners. Complete denial of the freedom of speech and assembly followed. Police brutality, Black Cossack terrorism, assaults and arrests were the order of the day.*) In the Pitts- burgh district meetings were prohibited as soon as the organiza- 4) Public Opinion and the Steel Strike, Pages 163 to 220. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE 13 tion campaign opened. The sheriff of Clairton ordered on Sep- tember 21st that “there should not be any meetings of any kind anywhere.”®) That the object of this campaign of terrorism was to break up the campaign of unionization was evident. Apro- pos of this situation the Department of Labor plainly said: “This denial of free speech and free assemblage had an undeniable influence on the strike. In Duquesne, for example, where meetings were prohibited, approxi- mately 50% of the men were reported to be organized. In Cleveland and Lackawanna, where the men were al- lowed to meet, approximately 80% were reported to be organized and the mills practically closed down when the strike was called.’ The victory achieved by the Steel Trust thru the aid of the Government lent great impetus to the Open-Shop drive. The policy of Gary’s corporation “not to deal with Union labor leaders at any time” became the battle-cry of the Open-Shop walriors. In the Mine Strike the Government pursued the same strike- breaking policy. The Democratic President Wilson declared the strike illegal. On October 24, 1919, he said that: “From whatever angle the subject may be viewed, it is apparent that such a strike in such circumstances would be the most far-reaching plan ever presented in this country to limit the facilities of production and dis- tribution of all the necessities of life. A strike under these circumstances is not only unjustifiable; it is un- lawful.” (Our italics). This declaration is a model anti-union statement. It has served as the source of inspiration to several of Harding’s anti- labor messages. 5) Senate Committee on Education and Labor, Vol. 2, Page 518— investigating the Steel Strike. 6) Monthly Labor Review, Dec. 1919, Vol. 9, No. 6, Page 92. 14 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER The Democratic Attorney-General Palmer spoke almost the very words subsequently used by his Republican successor, Daugherty, during the Railroad strike. On October 29, 1919, Palmer declared: “The illegality of the strike can and will be estab- lished without in any way impairing the right to strike, and the general right to strike is not the issue in any sense whatsoever in the present situation. This is true because the circumstances differentiate this case from the case of any other strike that has ever taken place in this country. It does not follow that any strike is lawful merely because the right to strike is recognized to exist.”” (Our italics). In the same statement Palmer pretended to be solicitous of the laborer’s inherent right to work and posed as a defender of the “right kind” of unionism. He announced: “Indeed, I am hearing from many sources that large numbers of the miners themselves do not wish to quit work and will not do so if assured the protection of the Government of which they properly feel them- selves a part. It is probably unnecessary for me to say that such protection will everywhere be given, so that men may exercise their undoubted right of continuing to work under such times and conditions as they shall see fit. The facts present a situation which challenges the supremacy of the law, and every resource of the Government will be brought to bear to prevent the na- tional disaster which would inevitably result from the cessation of the mining operations.” (Our italics). Here we have an official endorsement of Government strike- breaking. We have the same hypocritical talk of the “Right to work” — by strikebreakers — to the detriment of the working class. The unbridled hypocrisy of all this talk of the “right to’ work” yells for help when one thinks of the fact that this same Government did not utter a single word or take a single step to- THE GRAND OFFENSIVE 15 wards guaranteeing this much-vaunted inherent right to the mil- lions of honest workers who were unemployed in 1914 and who refused to betray their brother-workers who may have been striking then. Our Democratic Congress was not to be outdone by the President and the Attorney-General. ‘The Senate made haste to endorse their strikebreaking activities and adopted the following resolution (S. Con. Res. 15—House of Representatives Con- curring) : “Whereas, the enforcement of the law and the maintenance of order for the security of life and pro- perty and the protection of the individual citizen in the exercise of the constitutional rights is the first and paramount duty of the Government and must be at all times vigorously and effectively safeguarded by the use of every means essential to that end: therefore be it “Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representa- tives concurring)”, That we hereby give the National Administration and all others in authority the assur- ance of our constant, continuous, and unqualified sup- port in the use of such constitutional and lawful means as may be necessary to meet the present industrial emergency and in vindicating the majesty and power of the Government in enforcing obedience to and re- spect for the Constitution, and the laws, and in fully protecting every citizen in the maintenance and ex- ercise of his lawful rights and the observance of his lawful obligations.” On November 8th, 1919, the Government’s lawyers, the Department of Justice, procured for the coal operators an in- junction restraining the union officials from aiding the strike in any way by “messages of encouragement or exhortation,” or from using any of the union funds for strike benefits. This injunction was based on the Lever Anti-Profiteering Act, a law enacted sup- posedly to stop profiteering while the war was on. This law was 16 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER not used against the capitalists. It was turned against the work- ers. On November 14, 1919, came the declaration of the reac- tionary labor leaders calling off the strike under the plea of “we won't fight our Government.” This confession of bankruptcy was a grim monument to the power of the United States Govern- ment as strikebreaker. The Government Organizes Wholesale Raids on Workers. Thru the “Red Raids” of January 1920, the Government threw its last spadeful of earth in preparing the ground for the subsequent powerful Open-Shop drive. Thousands of militant workers were arrested. Hundreds were deported. The attack was launched against the foreign-born workers who form a very large proportion of our working class. In this attack the Com- munist Party of America was driven underground and the Gov- ernment succeeded in intimidating hundreds of thousands of foreign-born workers. The industrial unrest gripping the coun- try was given a Red tinge. “Un-Americanism,” “disloyalty,” “treason” and “bolshevism” were the stock-in-trade of the Gov- ernment’s fake advertising campaign of the Open-Shop drive. The object was twofold: to blind and divide the workers by in- jecting the nationality issue into the struggle, and to break the morale of the whole working class by meting out severe punish- ment to its most advanced advocates. By a campaign of un- paralleled brutality the militant spirit of the workers was dealt a crushing blow. The ground was fully prepared for the heavy artillery of the employers to open up its infernal barrage on the workers. The Open-Shop Drive Open-Shop campaigns are not new in America. But the Open-Shop drive launched in 1920, on a country-wide scale, was by far the best organized and the best financed we have yet had. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE 17 It was strongly centralized thru the powerful leadership of the Steel Trust whose tentacles reached out to all phases of industry thru its numerous interlocking directorates, banks, and the con- trol of coal, railroads, cement, and many other basic industries. Gary was the High Priest of this unholy crusade against the working class. The Democratic President appointed Gary as a representa- tive of the “public” to his First Industrial Conference. At this conference, Wilson’s attempt to stave off the industrial conflict was sunk beneath a sea of words. Gary made an impassioned plea for the Open-Shop on behalf of the “public.” Wilson’s Second Industrial Conference was a fizzle for the same reasons. Masked under such names as the “American Idea,” the “American Plan” and 57 other varieties of this brand of Ameri- canism the drive made tremendous headway. Chambers of Com- merce, Kiwanis Clubs, Rotary Clubs and many other commercial organizations loyally fell in line and formed a compact network of Open-Shop nuclei thruout the country.. In its Referendum No. 31—“Employment Relations”— held June 9th to July 24th, 1919, the United States Chamber of Commerce adopted the fol- lowing resolution by a vote of 1676 against 4: “The right of open shop operation, that is the right of the employer and employee to enter into and to de- termine the conditions of employment relations with each other, is an essential part of the individual right of contract possessed of each of the parties.” Over 1,500,000 pieces of propaganda literature were put out in 1920. On October 15 of the same year the National As- sociation of Manufacturers openly announced the establishment of a special Open-Shop Department to direct the drive. In a speech delivered before the National Founders’ Association, Pres- ident William H. Barr spoke in this manner: 18 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER “A change has been brought about by the de- termination of men to free themselves from the un- sound and unnatural control so imposed upon them. Today, that determination is manifest in the Open-Shop movement. Its progress is a matter of economy to those who began it; of consolation to those engaged in industry; and a stimulant to the patriotism of every- one. A partial, but careful survey of irresistible acti- vities in behalf of the Open-Shop show that 540 organi- zations in 247 cities of 44 States are engaged in pro- moting this American principle in the employment relations. A total of 23 national industrial associa- tions are included in these agencies. In addition, 1665 local Chambers of Commerce, are also pledged to the principle of the Open-Shop.” On January 16, 1921, Mr. J. Philip Bird, General Manager of the National Association of Manufacturers, made a similar boast. He said: “More than five hundred organizations in 250 cities have now endorsed the Open-Shop plan and prominent manufacturers declare they could not stem the tide if they wished.” Thru the energetic efforts of the Manufacturers’ Association of Illinois—an organization vying with the Associated Employ- ers of Indianapolis for the prime honors in giving a national color to the organization of the drive— the first national Open- Shop convention, the “American Idea Convention,” was called to order in Chicago on January 21st, 1921. Among the leaders of this open shop drive were to be found the following organizations: The National Association of Manu- facturers, National Open-Shop Association, the National Erectors’ Association, the National Founders’ Association, the National Metal Trades’ Association, and the League for Industrial Rights. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE 19 Object of the Drive The Industrial Relations Committee thus defined the object of the Open-Shop movement: “The ‘Open-Shop’, even if union men are not dis- criminated against, is, as much a denial of the right of collective action as the ‘Anti-union-shop’.” In neither is the collective action of the employees per- mitted for the purpose of negotiating with reference to labor conditions.’”) And in a letter to the Weekly Review (January 12, 1921), Mr. Ernest G. Draper, President of the American Creosoting Co., writing on the significance of the Open-Shop drive said: “They are out to crack organized labor and crack it wide open. ‘They will do it carefully, secretly, perhaps, with the aid of any convenient slogan. But they will do it if they can.” The National Catholic Welfare Council saw the purpose of this movement very clearly. Its Social Action Department made the following statement: “The Open-Shop drive masks under such names as the ‘American Plan’ and hides behind the pretense of American freedom. Yet its real purpose is to destroy all effective labor unions and thus subject the working people to the complete domination of the employers. Should it succeed in the measure that its proponents hope, it will thrust far into the ranks of the underpaid the body of the American working people.”®) (Our italics). The philosophy of this drive has been clearly elucidated in a speech delivered by Judge Gary at a meeting of the stockhold- ers of the United States Steel Corporation on April 18, 1921: 7) U. S. Commission on Industrial Relations, Final Report, 1915, P. 8) The Survey, Dec. 4, 1920, Page 350. 20 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER “I believe they (the labor unions) may have been justified in the long past, for I think the workmen were not always treated justly; that because of their lack of experience or otherwise they were unable to protect themselves; and therefore needed the assistance of out- siders in order to secure their rights. “But whatever may have been the conditions of employment in the long past, and whatever may have been the results of unionism, concerning which there is at least much uncertainty, there is, at present, in the opinion of the large majority of both employers and employees, no necessity for labor unions; and that no benefit nor advantage thru them will accrue to anyone except the union labor leaders. “But still our opinion is that the existence and conduct of labor unions in this country, at least are inimical to the best interests of the employees, the em- ployers and the general public.” Professor Commons has characterized this philosophy in these words: “The Steel Corporation has kept ahead of the game; not by doing better than the labor unions can do, but by doing worse and doing it in the name of ‘Liberty and the Open-Shop’.”®? The Open-Shoppers At Work A. SECRECY The Open-Shoppers did not stop at anything to crush labor. A subsidized press, a hireling church, undercover men and meth- ods shrouded in sinister secrecy characterized their drive against the workers. Apropos of this, Prof. Clarence E. Bonnett says: “There is much that is confidential and secret about associations. In the conflict, one must not let 9) Industrial Government, by John R. Commons, Page 265. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE one’s opponent know in advance one’s plans or proposed methods, nor one’s real fighting strength, unless that is so great as to intimidate one’s opponent. For this rea- son, much of the work of the associations is conducted secretly. In some cases, lists of members are not made public because some of the employers fear that the unions may single them out and punish them. It also permits an employer apparently to be friendly to the union, because he dares not fight it openly, yet to fight it secretly. Then there are doubtful practices which the association engaging in them, does not wish to make public. Illegal activities are of the last sort.””!0) 21 Much capital has been made by the propagandists of this anti-union conspiracy concerning the spontaneity of their move- ments. tions rip The following typical appeals of Open-Shop organiza- the veil off this “spontaneity”: AMERICAN EMPLOYERS OPEN SHOP ASSOCIATION eee Suite 356, 29 So. La Salle Street Chicago, [linois, Nov. 23, 1920. Attention General Manager: Omaha, Neb. Dear Sir: We are writing you at this time to at- tempt to get you or your company into the Open-Shop Association. As the time is ripe for all manufacturing concerns to run their shops as they see fit, and not to be dictated to by some unscrupulous delegate from some union. You may see the point that we are driving at very elearly. The Open-Shop Association will do a great deal for its members. 10) Page 552. 1) Should you be threatened with a labor con- Employers Ass’ns. in the United States, by Clarence E. Bonnett, 22 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER troversy or strike, you can immediately get in touch with us and we will handle that situation for you. 2) Should you want an undercover man on the inside among your employees, we will also furnish you such a man, and you will receive a daily report on what is going on. 3) In the event of trouble, we will replace any man that may strike against you. 4) We establish Welfare Clubs in your plant from which you derive a lot of benefit; and all manufac- turers are alive to this issue. Our membership is growing larger every day and we would be glad to have you also fill out the accom- panying application for membership in this institution. The initiation fee is $50 and the yearly dues is $25. Trusting that you will acknowledge receipt of this letter, we remain, Yours truly, AMERICAN EMPLOYERS OPEN SHOP ASsSOCIATION.1? Here is another letter sent out by the National Open-Shop Association with headquarters at Indianapolis, Philadelphia and San Antonio: “Gentlemen: We have been in correspondence with your Manufacturers’ Association relative to us organiz- ing a local Open Shop Association in your city for the purpose of putting into effect there the principles of the Open-Shop, a copy of which we are enclosing you. “So as to proceed with this work effectively, we desire to secure 25 charter members and we are writ- ing you in strict confidence, hoping that you can see your way clear to signify your willingness to join us in this movement providing we find it advisable to go ahead with our plans. “This work must be clothed with the utmost sec- recy, as we have found that publicity usually defeats 11) See “The Open Shop Drive” by Savel Zimand, Page 37. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE 23 our purposes. For this reason you can feel sure that we will treat the matter in strict confidence. “Please let us hear from you regarding the matter, and we will gladly furnish any additional information you may desire. “NATIONAL OPEN SHOP ASSOCIATION. (Our Italics) (Signed) James L. Glass, Sec’y.”!” B. PRESS AND CHURCH The report of the Interchurch World Movement affords an excellent study of the splendid services rendered by the Press and Church to the Steel Trust, the heart and soul of the Na- tional Open-Shop movement.!) Cc. UNDERCOVER MEN This same authority investigating the Steel Strike of 1919 has conclusively proved that the Open-Shoppers make very wide use of undercover men. Mr. Sidney Howard investigating the use of “invisible serv- ice” agencies for the New Republic showed that one of these firms has done so much business during a year that it was paying an annual income tax of $258,000. Quoting from the testimony of Mr. Sherman of the Sherman Service, Inc., in its injunction suit against the Butler Agency of Philadelphia, Mr. Howard presents the following: “Thru our secret operatives and particularly those who had gained influential positions in the local organi- zation, we are able to anticipate every move of the strikers and by this means . . . . were able to have several arrests made which resulted in proper convic- tions, . 12) Quoted by Samuel Gompers in the American Federationist, Oct: 1922, Page 733. 13) Public Opinion and the Steel Strike—Pages 87-163 and Pages 261-306. 24 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER “The local union was disorganized and that national industry of which our client is the great majority, has not been unionized.”!4) Another method of the drive is that employed by the Cor- porations’ Auxiliary Company. “CORPORATIONS’ AUXILIARY COMPANY “1836 Euciip AVENUE, “Cleveland, Ohio, October 18, 1920. “Personal and Confidential “Gentlemen: “Enclosed is a folder entitled “The Power of Knowledge’ that briefly points the way for you to obtain mastery over every labor problem in your organization. “Many of the biggest, ablest, and most successful executives in the United States today, will join us in recommending to you, the service outlined in this folder. “The writer or one of our other executives will be in your vicinity the week after next and will be glad to arrange his appointments to call on you. He will ex- plain in person exactly what we can do for you. This consultation will obligate you to nothing. “Will it be convenient for you to make an appoint- ment during the week after next? “Thanking you in advance for the courtesy of your reply, we are, “CORPORATIONS’ AUXILIARY COMPANY, “(Signed) J. H. Smith, “President.”!5) D. BOYCOTT | In his testimony before the Lockwood Joint Legislative Com- mittee, Mr. C. E. Cheney, Secretary of the National Erectors’ Association gave evidence of the solidarity permeating the ranks 14) The New Republic Feb. 23, 1921, Page 363. 15) Quoted by Savel Zimand in “The Open Shop Drive,” Page 38. THE GRAND OFFENSIVE 29 of the Open-Shoppers. He testified that the National Fabricators’ Association had “adjusted the policy of the members so that the steel fabricated by them is erected in Open-Shop.” And the Iron League, another implacable foe of organized labor, adopted the following resolution at a special meeting: “Complying with the order of the Board of Gov- ernors of the Building Trades Employers’ Association, no advance in wages can be made and the secretary will so notify members.” E. THE OPEN-SHOP UNION Another method of fighting unionism is thus treated by Professor Bonnett. “The belligerent associations did not make an un- conditional surrender. The entire ground of the struggle is now being fought over again, and with more bitterness than ever before. The records show that we have been passing thru the greatest strike period of all history. Any one who has studied the attitude and activities of the belligerent associations during the past twenty years will be inclined to believe that the unions will lose much of the ground they gained during the war period of 1914-1918. if i During the period 1919-1921 many ‘open-shop’ associations have been formed in various localities. Employers in many industries are attempt- ing to free themselves from union domination fastened upon them during the war. One of the most discussed methods of fighting unionism is the “Shop Union’—that is the union of only the employees in a shop. Such a union has no ‘entangling alliances’ with any other union.”!6) 16) Prof. Clarence E. Bonnett in “Employers Ass’ns. in the U. S., Pages 28 and 30. 26 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER Resulis of the Drive No union was immune from this fierce capitalist onslaught. Even for the railroad workers the right to organize became a vital issue. In decision No. 220, August 3, 1921, the U.S. Railway Labor Board held: “That the Carrier (the Pennsylvania Rail- road) was right in insisting upon proof that the organization represented a majority of the workers involved,” before dealing with it. This was intended as a mortal blow at labor unionism on the railways. It was the entering wedge for the smashing anti-union offensive of the Railway Corporations, and it was the Government that struck the first blow.!” Summing up the effect of this drive on the workers, Samuel Gompers portrayed the following picture: “The fact is that these organizations had to fight for life. They have been driven to fight for their exist- ence, for their freedom, for the very bedrock rights of American free men. They have seen employers break contracts, they have had to resist drastic wage reduc- tions, they have been confronted with innumerable op- positions, defiances and blows at their very existence. The Miners, the Printers, the Granite Cutters, the Quarry workers, the Packing House workers—these are but some of the organizations with which organized em- ployers have wantonly broken their pledged word, their written agreement. The workers have had the proof in their daily experiences. Tomes could tell them noth- ing more.”!8) 17) Bulletin No. 303, U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, March 1922, Page 94. 18) The American Federationist, Oct. 1922, Page 738. CHAPTER II. THE GREAT DEPRESSION Depression Sets in \\iaeteg the workers were being driven back by the capitalists a severe depression overtook the country. By the middle of 1920 the prices of bonds reached the low- est level since the Civil War. By July 1921, pig iron fell to a point relatively lower than that reached in any other depression. The volume of business dropped 25%—a 5% greater fall than is usual in depression. For the fiscal year ending June 30, 1921, the export of cotton fell three million bales below the average of the five years next preceding the war. Chief among the causes of this economic crisis were the collapse of America’s European market and the difficulties in- volved in the problems of readjusting the mechanism of produc- tion and exchange to a peace basis. In 1921 our total exports declined 45% and those to Europe and South America fell off by two billion dollars. Our total imports declined 52%. That this decline in foreign trade is not yet over is evident from the report of the Department of Commerce for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1922. America’s total foreign trade for this fiscal year was $6,379,000,000 as compared with $10,170,- 000,000 in the previous year. In the last year imports fell from $3,654,000,000 to $2,608,000,000 and exports fell from $6,516,- 000,000 to $3,771,000,000. 27 28 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER Deflation and Unemployment At the same time the financiers tightened up on credits. The campaign of deflation was on. Addressing the U. S. Senate on Sept. 20, 1922, the late “Tom” Watson of Georgia, pointed out that: “In December, 1920, there was in circulation 34 billion dollars. In December, 1921, there was in cir- culation 24 billion dollars. | “There was a difference of ten billion dollars and the veriest amateur in the study of economics, knows in his mind, his heart and his soul that it is a crime to take that amount of money out of circulation in so short a period. It is bound to mean abandoned farms and broken homes. It is bound to mean destitution, beg- gary, and suicide. It has always been so and always will be so. “Those who control the volume of money are like those who have their hand around your neck. They can choke off or let on the flow of blood. “Unless this system is changed this Government is going into a vortex of revolution and a new Government will arise and take its place.” The very men who during the war were calling for more and more production, were now shutting down mills and factories. With the demobilization of the Army and Navy, hundreds of thousands were thrown into the already huge army of unem- ployed. Writing on this crisis in the winter of 1921-22 to his Conference on Unemployment, President Harding said: “We have just passed the winter of the greatest unemployment in the history of our country.” The number of unemployed had been estimated to range up to six million. In October 1921, the President’s Unemployment Conference, making a conservative estimate, declared “The Con- ference finds that there are estimated from 3,500,000 to 5,500,000 THE GREAT DEPRESSION 29 unemployed and there is a much greater number dependent upon them.” In so far as remedial steps were concerned, the con- ference turned out to be a flat fizzle. Bitterness of the Struggle The intense bitterness of the class conflict grew out of the political and economic conditions. Terrified by the disturbed world political conditions, the capitalists determined to smash every organ of working-class resistance. The unions, of course, had to bear their share of the attack. The severe depression with its millions of unemployed gave the employers further stimulus to cut wages and rob the workers of the laboring conditions previously won. The capitalists saw their only chance of securing profits approaching the fabulous war gains thru a reduction of wages, thru the lengthening of the hours of labor and the progressive deterioration of the working conditions. That the fierce determination of the capitalists to slash wages was due in a large measure to their becoming profit-mad during the war period can be seen from the gigantic profits they reaped then. In four of the industries closely allied to railroads, we had the following surpluses piled up during 1916-1920. ERE Wig St. oe Sik asst tines Bucditss $825,958,160 Spa and sCok6 ss iiasicdede'sisv at 139,075,444 PSPAOTNOTIE forbade Oe shee w+ 139,791,071 Other Supply Concerns ...... 182,782,372 Prand Lotal ee dsia. oo ee $1,287,607,047 » Senator Capper in a speech before the Senate declared that the fabulous profits paid to the coal barons and steel magnates during the war more than paid for the whole value of the coal 1) From the Testimony of Bert M. Jewell of the Railway Employees Department of the A. F. of L. before the Railway Labor Board, March 1922. 30 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER mines and steel mills. Throughout the war the Government failed with unfailing regularity to regulate the prices of copper, gaso- line, steel and coal—the very commodities whose owners were the backbone of the Open-Shop drive. Senate Document No. 259 discloses a legion of facts as to riotous profiteering running into thousands of per cent in some instances. On the basis of the income tax returns, ex-Secretary of the Treasury, Wm. G. McAdoo charged that the profits of some coal operators, ranked as high as 2000 per cent and that 100 per cent profits on capital stock were not uncommon. During the war the banks of the U. S. made a profit of $1,747,605,000. This sum was three times as great as for a similar period before the war. Pungent comment on this mass of profits is made by John Thomas Taylor, Legislative Representative of the American Legion, in a letter to Congressmen and Senators: “These enormous bank profits of nearly one and three quarters billions of dollars are in addition to the profits which were not retained such as dividends, extra dividends and bonus payments to their own employees during the war period. “A large proportion of these unprecedented profits were made and retained by the New York banks con- trolled by the great financial interests which are leading the fight against adjusted compensation for veterans on ‘principle’. One might say on ‘principal and inter- est’. 29 When the bottom fell out of the European market and the world depression seized America these huge profits ceased to flow. But the capitalists were determined to continue making the greatest profits possible. They organized a terrific cam- paign against the workers to deflate them of more of their already meagre earnings. THE GREAT DEPRESSION 3] A Study in Contrast Let no one for a moment cultivate the notion that the em- ployers were ruined by the depression. A perusal of the columns of the financial press reveals a startling one-sidedness in the casu- alties suffered by the workers and their capitalist exploiters. The score is positively and decisively against the workers. Judged: by the number of business failures, January 1922 hit the bottom at 2,723. This same month hit the peak of divid- end and interest payments, $359,800,000. In 1921 average monthly payments of dividends and inter- est to security holders totalled $296,000,000. Taking 1913 as a normal year, this was an increase of 100%. And according to the monthly records of dividend and inter- est payments made by the Journal of Commerce of New York, payments were 4% greater in 1921 than in 1920, when we take the actual income as a whole. From the following survey, covering 29 corporations, it is seen that many companies fared even better in 1921, the year of depression, than in 1920, one of the prosperity years. Table Showing Net Profits of Corporations in Prosperity of 1920 and in Depression of 1921! 1920 1921 Name of Corporation Net Profits Dividend Paym’t Net Profits Dividend Paym’t Per Share Per Share American Telephone and Telegraph Co. .. $51,821,215 $54,002,703 American Woolen Co... 4,626,855 $ 4.57 6,006,648 $ 8.01 Associated Dry Goods.. 4,11 10.24 Atchison, Topeka & Santa Ke R, RR. .... .eese0,590 13.98 41,268,307 14.69 Atlantic Gulf and West Indies Steamship IES PE ees eels 148,231 1,781,337 32 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER Net Prorits or CorPORATIONS—Continued 1920 1921 Name of Corporation Net Profits Dividend Paym’t Net Profits Dividend Paym’t ~~ Per Share Per Share Baldwin Locomotive BOTES 0 Stina te cl tices $15.14 $18.22 California Petroleum Corporation Ay 9.29 11.45 Chicago, Indianapolis & Louisville R. R. .... —$1,133,893 (loss) $723,564 Commonwealth Power, Railway & Light Co. 797,738 1,838,767 Delaware & Hudson Railway Co. ....... 4,933,162 4,937,452 Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Railway Go-tste asic ets 1,088,316 1,260,777 Endicott Johnson Corp.. 3,150,441 6.43 4,642,889 10.79 General Electric ..... 26,420,616 28,155,667 Lackawanna R. R. .... 14,658,444 19,518,403 Lehigh Valley R. R... 1,596,963 2.62 9,788,066 8.29 Missouri, Pacific R. R. 3,033,075 3,537,018 Ne Ys; Central “Rui RA‘... oi sos hoa0or 5.50 22,295,685 8.93 N. Y. Telephone ...... 6,070,073 4.04 13,244,543 8.29 Northern Pacific R. R. 19,094,184 22,065,399 Pere Marquette R. R. 1,393,972 3,765,879 Public Service Corp. of New Jersey ...... 2,218,408 5,12 3,594,629 9.19 R. G. Reynolds Tobacco 10,691,294. 16,258,322 Southern California Bison | 0% Sok rs 3,071,795 3,444,027 Studebaker Corp. ..... 15.20 10,409,601 16.20 Tennessee Copper & Chemical ........ —285,889 (loss) 147,175 U. S. Realty & Improvement ....... 2,487,803 15.39 2,704,651 16.73 Virginia R. R. Co..... 3,287,461 5,245,827 Wabash R. R. Co. .... —7,369,827 (loss) 2,017,575 Wells Fargo & Co..... 453,041 1.89 1,279,707 5.34 THE GREAT DEPRESSION 33 The Workers Lose Now let us see whether the workers were subjected to the same “casualties.” Analyzing the 1921 payrolls of 1648 concerns, employing one third of the total number of factory workers in the State, the New York State Industrial Commission concluded that because of wage cuts and unemployment, the workers got but 71.4% of what they received in 1920. In the analysis by the Wisconsin State Industrial Commis- sion of 211 payrolls in 1921 covering one third of all the indus- trial workers, we find that the workingmen in Wisconsin received only 55% of the 1920 wage. A comparison of the wages the New York State workers re- ceived in December 1921 with those received by them at the peak of prosperity in 1920, shows that in the wage-fall their pay had gone down fully 33-1/3%. On the same basis the Wisconsin workingmen suffered a cut of more than 50%. Even such a strongly conservative authority as the National Industrial Conference Board has found that: “The percentage of decline for the three groups from the peak months up to July 1921 were as follows: Common labor, 17.3 per cent; skilled labor, 15.2 per cent; women, 14.6 per cent.”?) Investigation of wage cuts by industries in the period of depression made by so conservative an agency as the Jacobs Company of Chicago gives us a more detailed picture of how the workers, unlike their employers, suffered from the depression. 2) Research Report No. 45, December, 1921—Page 8, National In- dustrial Conference Board. 34 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER No. of workers No. of Establishments Per cent Industry involved involved Wage-Cut Bootuandg shoe vee, i855) \eieiere 39 17.5 Building trades ....... 200,000 in 183 cities 17.1 Clothing workers ...... 100,000 : 16.7 Cotton, Wool and Leather Manufacturing 340,000 69 20-24 Tron aNd -StOE] Mee. nis ae lee een np 19.2 IVI DE eee ere wits ca eee er es anes he 19.5 Miscellaneous Industries 866 ay 16.4 Packers icpiienud etnias 200,000 RA 255 Public Employees ..... 100,000 in 8 cities 16.5 Railway and Express .. 1,879,000 ie 123 silk manitfacturing™ 25.) /2.20 7 ee 25 mills 16.2 Street Railway and and other Utility Men 140,000 se 14.8 For five million workers the Jacobs Company found an average wage reduction of 16.1% in 1921 alone. The Sixth Bi-Monthly Survey of the National Industrial Conference Board, May 1922, further found that in 1921 the wage decreases ranged from: Per Cent Wage Cut Industry SD LOwed , aan oe In the Building trades LOSTORZS oF LN In the Clothing trades OE a. ea In the Granite Cutters trade Loco e iuetsee In the Marine Workers trades Py A ed iene In the Metal trades Dee Leeann ee In the Shoe Industry in New England These are some of the casualties of the wave of depression for the workers. On the one hand we have the capitalists, in the midst of America’s severest economic crisis, receiving greater dividends and interest than ever before; in many instances ac- tually increasing their annual net income by millions of dollars. THE GREAT DEPRESSION 35 On the other hand we see millions unemployed and millions sub- jected to progressively deteriorating working conditions and rapidly declining wages. Again, while the employers were perfecting their fighting associations, the workers’ organizations were steadily losing their membership in the face of the capitalist onslaught and severe depression. The membership of the International Sea- men’s Union dropped from 115,000 in 1920 to 50,000 in 1921. The Maintenance of Way Men lost almost 125,000 members in this crisis. The American Federation of Labor lost 710,893 members; its official figures falling down to 3,195,635. And there are many who believe that these figures would be much more accurate if they were somewhere in the neighborhood of two and a half million. The Farmers and Soldiers Are Hard Hit But the organized and unorganized workers were not the only ones hard hit by the economic crisis. The farmers and those workers who had bled for their employers on the battle- fields of France were also very deep in the slough of normalcy. Mr. Hanford Macnider, formerly National Commander of the American Legion, describing the desperate conditions wel- coming the ex-soldiers on their return home said: “Frank J. Bart of West Hoboken, N. J., wears the Congressional Medal of Honor, the highest award for bravery granted by America; and also the Croix de Guerre with three palms, the French Medaille Militaire, the Italian Croce de Guerra and the Montenegrin War Cross. “.. » This man walked the streets for fifteen months in search of work. Only a few months ago he secured a job as general utility man in the office of his County Clerk. 36 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER “Experiences as-bitter and as hard to understand have been undergone by hundreds of thousands of his comrades. Desperate from hunger and want, ex-soldiers of America have told our employment agencies that they will do anything. Jobless and without money, F. W. Smith, of Omaha, Neb., honorably discharged from the service of the U. S. and head of a family of three, grasped at the chance for ‘work’ offered by the Legion Employment Service and sold his blood at hospitals for $25 a pint. For several months blood for transfusion operations in a hospital at Cleveland, Ohio, has been supplied by unemployed veterans. “Such conditions as these were at their worst dur- ing the past winter. A national survey of the situation, showed that there were more than 700,000 veterans of the World War out of work and almost out of hope.’?) In an address on the rail and coal strikes before a gathering of farmers in Virginia, the Secretary of Agriculture, Wailace, admitted the utter helplessness of the farmers. “The farmers have endeavored to get relief by all lawful means. They have appealed to the Adminis- tration, to Congress, and to every other agency which they thought might be able to aid them.” All the golden election promises turned into the usual leaden performances. Mr. Wallace declared that in 1921 the purchas- ing power of the farmer was actually less from 25 to 45% than. in 1913. At the same time that the employing class was paying the worker less and less for his labor power, they were also paying the farmers less and less for their products. In June 1922, the Bureau of Markets and Crop Estimates of the Department of Agriculture announced that the average value per acre of the ten 3) Current History—N. Y. Times, July 1922, Page 548. 4) “Labor”’—Aug. 26, 1922—Page 4. THE GREAT DEPRESSION 37 crops constituting 9/10 of all crop production, dropped from the average value of $34.74 per acre in 1919, to $14.52 per acre in 1921l—a fall of almost 59%. Today the farmers who toil from sunrise to sunset are heavily in debt to these same capital- ists that oppress and expoit the city workers. They owe in farm mortgages alone, approximately: $1,500,000,000 to Commercial banks 1,250,000,000 to Insurance Companies 5,200,000,000 to Farm Mortgage Companies We find that even exclusive of what is due on machinery, in exorbitant interest, and debts for other sundry items, the farm- ers owe the money and land sharks a tribute of at least $8,000,- 000,000. The sum is probably much larger, for many farmers do not report their mortgage debts because they fear that their neighbors or others might learn the information. Said the well-known financier, Eugene Meyer: “The collapse in agriculture and in the banking situation in the agricultural districts was characterized by an attempt to collect loans on farm commodities in too short a period.’ But the capitalists pressed the collection of these debts, re- gardless of the depression. This is the condition in which the farmers find themselves today after passing the economic crisis—a phenomenon inherent in the very nature of capitalist production and recurring with persistent regularity at almost definite intervals. | 5) From Speech delivered by Eugene Meyer Jr., Managing Director— War Finance Corp., before the State Bank Division of the American Bank- ers’ Ass’n., Oct. 2, 1922, N. Y. City. 38 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER Wage Cuts Are Very Painful In their wage-cutting and union-smashing drive, the em- ployers have spread considerable misinformation as to the real earnings of the workers. They have deliberately exaggerated the gains made by the workers during the “war prosperity” in order to excuse their fierce campaign of deflating wages. The findings of the most authoritative investigators, decisively dispel these illusions and misinformation. Said the Federal Council of Churches: “It cannot be too often repeated that high wages during the war were by no means so general as believed, and that the demand for a reduction in wages in propor- tion to the reduction of living costs has been made without reference to the fact that wages, prior to the war, were too low, and cannot be fairly taken as a basis of wage determination.”® This same authority goes on to say that: “Even without reference to the general movement of real wages, working peoples’ earnings since the be- ginning of the war have been greatly exaggerated in the public mind. They are thought of in the terms of what the carpenter or the plumber, or the railroad engineer, or the highly skilled steel worker has been able to com- mand. Even in these apparently favored occupations, the total earnings are often much less than the wage rate indicates, on account of under-employment.””) Loss of labor time thru unemployment and irregularity of employment takes a heavy toll from the workingmen. The American Federated Engineering Society has found that on the average the shoemaker works but 65% of his time; the cloth- ing worker 69%; the building trades worker about 63%. Ir- 6) Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America, Labor Sun- day Message, 1922—Page 5. 7) “The Wage Question,” Page 18—Federal Council of Churches. THE GREAT DEPRESSION 39 regularity of employment is a chronic disease in the mining and textile industries.®) A refutation of the employers’ exaggerated claims as to wages, based on their own figures, was made public in October 1922, by the National Catholic Welfare Council. The latter’s investigation disclosed that: In the period of the seven and a half years from the beginning of the war, the skilled workers gained 4.5 per cent, the unskilled workers gained 1% and the wom- en gained almost 15% as compared with the cost of liv- ing figures furnished by the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. The average worker in the manufacturing indus- tries gained 4.5 per cent. The average skilled worker in these industries made about $1,325 a year; the aver- age unskilled worker about $1,025 a year, and the aver- age woman about $825. Using 1914 money on the basis of the cost of liv- ing, the skilled workers received 63c a week more than they did on the eve of the war; unskilled men got 12c; and women $1.15 a week more. In Some Industries Workers Fare Worse Mr. Basil Manly, who often acted as Joint Chairman of the War Labor Board with Chief Justice Taft, has investigated the wage question and has found that: The pick miners received 52c a ton in 1900; in 1913 they received 65c a ton and in 1921 $1.16 a ton. During this period the purchasing power of these wages compared with the rate of 52c per ton in 1900 was only 48.5c in 1913 and 42.79c in 1921. The conductors and railroad engineers do not fare any better.. Today the wages of the former buy $95 less and the wages of the latter buy $162 less than they did in 1900. 8) “Waste in Industry,” Page 16—American Federated Engineering Society, 1921. 9) “Are Wages too High?”—by Basil Manly. 40 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER And the lot vf the steel workers is even worse, according to the Interchurch World Movement Report: “The annual earnings of over one-third of all pro- ductive iron and steel workers were, and had been for years, below the level set by Government experts as the minimum of subsistence standard for families of five. “The annual earnings of 72% of all workers were, and had been for years below the level set by Govern- -ment experts as the minimum of comfort level for fa- milies of five.’”1°) Since then the steel wages have been cut 40% and raised 20%. Mr. Manly then sums up: “We have now completed a survey of wage sta- tistics covering substantially all the workers employed in manufacturing, mining and transportation, and we have found that, except in a few isolated trades and oc- cupations, wages have failed to keep pace with the cost of living; and that substantially the American workers are therefore less well off than they were at the begin- ning of the century.” “Suppose we find that the wages of any workers have increased even faster than the cost of living, are we therefore to decide with equal positiveness, that such wages are too high! Let us see. Suppose that 20 years ago these particular workers were notoriously sweated, or were admittedly underpaid. It would then be ne- cessary that their wages be advanced faster than the cost of living, in order to bring them up to any decent level.’’!) “Because of the rising prices and profiteering, the dollar as a means of maintaining a home was worth when we entered the war in 1917, only half as much 10) From the Interchurch World Movement Report on the Steel Strike in 1919. 11) “Are Wages too High?”—by Basil Manly—Page 13. 12) Ibid—Page 4 THE GREAT DEPRESSION 41 as the dollar of 1900, and by 1920 only one third. Compared with 1900, therefore, every dollar of the worker’s wages was worth only 49c in 1917 and 33c in 1920. The man who made two dollars a day in 1900, therefore had to make six dollars a day in 1920, simply to ‘break even’,”’) On the basis of official Government figures, Basil Manly has constructed the following: Table Showing the Purchasing Power of Union Wages Since 1907.\) Relative Rate of Wages Buying Powerof Relative Buying Year Per Week-Full Time One Dollar Power of Union Wage 1907 100 100 cents 100 1913 109 82 cents 89 1914, lll 79 cents 88 1915 112 78 cents 86 1916 116 69 cents 80 1917 1s 58 cents ig 1918 142 47 cents 66 1919 162 44, cents 71 1920 206 39 cents 81 1921 209 45 cents 94, It is interesting to note that 1918 which was a banner year of profits for the employers was one of the worst years for the workingmen in so far as the actual purchasing power of the dollar is concerned. Standards of Living Considerable emphasis on the high American standards of living is continuously laid by the propagandists of the employers. As Royal Meeker, formerly Commissioner of Labor Statis- tics, has said: 13) Ibid—Page 6 14) Ibid—Page 7 42 THE GOVERNMEN T—STRIKEBREAKER “Even in the higher income groups conditions are not so easy as they are frequently pictured to us. Let us not be fooled by the cry that the American standard of living is the highest in the world.”}») An examination of the following authoritatively prepared budgets, reveals the fact that the majority of the American work- ing class falls below the minimum level set by recognized re- sponsible agencies.!° Author of Budget Place and Date Total Amt. of Budget Wm. F. Ogburn, for Seattle, Wash. $1,505.60 Seattle-Takoma St. Ry. October 1917 Arbitration Jessica B. Piexotto San Francisco, Cal. $1,476.40 October 1917 Wm. F. Ogburn for the New York City $1,760.50 National War Labor July 1918 Board Philadelphia Bureau of Philadelphia $1,636.79 Municipal Research October 1918 Wm. F. Ogburn, for the Washington, D. C. $2,262.47 United Mine Workers August 1919 U. S. Bureau of Labor Bituminous Mining Towns $2,243.94 Statistics 1919 U. S. Bureau of Labor Chicago, III. $2,445.65 Statistics (Quantity November 1921 Budget priced by Labor Bureau, Inc.) Dr. Abraham Epstein, Director, Pennsylvania Old Age Pen- sion Commission, writing under the caption “Have American Wages Permitted an American Standard of Living?” sheds il- luminating comment on the budget question. 15) Monthly Labor Review, Volume 9, No. 1, July, 1919—page 13. 16) Federal Council of Churches, Bulletin No, 1—the Wage Question =—page 14, THE GREAT DEPRESSION 43 “It is patent that despite the tremendous increase in wages, experienced during the last six years, only a few classes of wage earners have succeeded in keep- ing pace with the increased cost of living. In the case of many workers, especially the skilled ones, the pur- chasing power of their increased wages for a full time week in 1920 was considerably less than it was in the pre-war days. And if the great mass of workers, did not receive what is authoritatively considered an Amer- ican living wage before the present advance in prices had begun, their standards at the present time are ne- cessarily lowered.”?”) According to the last income tax returns those who received a thousand dollars or more per year, number only 5,332,760—-cr about 5% of the total population. There are 41,609,192 persons gainfully employed in the United States. This is 50.3 per cent of the total population of ten years of age and over. These figures also include employers, high government officials, and higher salaried employees. All of the latter undoubtedly receive more than $1,000 per year. It is obvious on the face of it that most of the workers fall below even this low income level. Sum- ming up his findings on the total inadequacy of the American wage today, Mr. Manly says: “]. American wages are not too high, judged by any fair standard of comparison. “2. With the exception of a few isolated occupa- tions that were miserably underpaid in- 1900, no class or group of workers has succeeded in maintaining un- impaired the real value of their wages as measured by the buying power which they possessed in 1900. “3. With the exception of a few isolated and ex- ceptionally skilled trades, the wages of American work- ers are insufficient, without supplement from other 17) Annals of the Amer. Academy of Political and Social Science, Sept. 1921. 44, THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER sources, to provide for the subsistence of a family con- sisting of husband, wife, and three minor children. Much less maintain them in that condition of ‘health and reasonable comfort’ which every humane considera- tion demands, “4, American Labor has been consistently de- _prived of its fair share in the ever-increasing product- ivity of the nation’s industries. It is this ever-increasing inequity that is at the root of the nation’s frequent in- dustrial depression. And it is out of this constant un- der-employment of labor that a large part of the great private fortunes and the huge surpluses of American corporations have been created.’’!®) It is plain to everyone from the above authoritative evidence that the high war time wages of the workers are a myth created by the capitalists. It is evident that the workers today are severely underpaid, even on the basis of the official figures of the Government and the employers’ associations. Living under such conditions, the workers were compelled to revolt against their employers whose interest is to exploit them in order to pile up huge profits. The Readjustment Strikes of 1921 But the progressive deterioration of the wage workers’ con- ditions and the resultant, constant enriching of the capitalists were not totally free from working class resistance; though it must be admitted that during the first period of attack, the workers were completely overwhelmed by the ferocious on- slaught of their employers. In the Spring and Summer of 1921 there were widespread “readjustment strikes’—strikes on the part of the workers to resist wage deflation. The building trade workers, the packers, 18) “Are Wages Too High?” by Basil Manly, Page 20. THE GREAT DEPRESSION A5 the garment workers and the printers doggedly resisted the at- tacks on their wages and their unions. The printers’ strike began on May 1, 1921, and lasted for more than a year. The workers revolted against the campaign for the Open-Shop and the continuation of the 48-hour week launched by the Employing Printers of America. At a cost of over ten million dollars, the International Typographical Union succeeded in warding off the attack. But some of the smaller and less strongly organized printers’ unions that had always resisted amalgamation in the industry met with defeat. Another notable strike of 1921, was the one waged by the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union. It was declared as a protest against the breaking of an agreement by the em- ployers. After two months of struggle the workers went back. They had repulsed the attack on their union. On December 5th the workers of the “Big Five” packers went on strike in defence of their unions and against a wage cut of 8c an hour for those working by the hour and a 121% per cent reduction for those employed on the piecework basis. The Packers also declared that on and after March 14th, 1921, overtime would be applied only after the 10th working hour or after 54 hours per week. In July the Packers petitioned for another cut in wages. Judge Alschuler, Administrator of the President’s Mediation Committee, denied their request on the ground that neither the condition prevailing in the industry it- self, nor the cost of living warranted this cut. The machinery of arbitration was then dropped. Company unions were set up, and on November 28th there came another wage reduction of three to seven and a half cents an hour. The Packers put this cut thru the farce of having it approved by the company unions. President Harding did not see fit to take any steps to have, let alone force, the Packers heed the award of the Govern- ment’s arbitration committee. The Packers also turned down 46 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER the efforts at arbitration made by the Secretary of Labor Davis. But the Government did not make the sliglitest effort to have the Packers obey its official decision. The Government went much further. In Denver, Colorado, 25 members of the union were found guilty of contempt of court in refusing to heed an order requiring them to return to work pending action by the State Industrial Commission. This commission had the same func- tion as the Kansas Industrial Court—to deny the workers the right to strike against their capitalist employers. These work- ers, unlike the Packers, were sent to jail. Injunctions restraining the strikers came in abundance. In Ottumwa, Iowa, Judge Anderson, of check-off notoriety, issued an injunction preventing picketing. Secretary of Labor Davis, made another attempt at arbi- tration and reported that: ‘The workers agreed to accept either, but the Pack- ers and their representatives refused and informed the Secretary that they did not desire mediation or arbitra- tion, as they had all the workmen they needed,” The strike was lost. It was broken by the Government. The workers who accepted the Government’s arbitration and media- tion were jailed. The Packers, the capitalists, who spurned and disregarded the Government’s efforts were protected and helped. The Government put at the disposal of the Packers, its military and judiciary power. The army and the courts reaped a harvest of casualties for the workers and a bumper crop of profits for the employers. Capitalists United—Workers Divided The capitalist offensive met with almost complete success. The employers were strongly united. The workers were hope- lessly divided into backward, inefficient craft unions, dominated by a reactionary bureaucracy that welcomed every opportunity THE GREAT DEPRESSION 7 47 to avoid a fight or run away from a struggle, even when it was forced upon them. The battle-cry of the reactionary labor leader- ship was put forward by Gompers: “It is not our choice that we resist injustice.”}9) Against this divided front of the workers, the capitalists pitted their powerfully organized and splendidly financed em- ployers’ associations. Besides, their Government—the U. S. Government—fully carried out its mission of guiding and cen- tralizing the fighting forces of reaction and put its full military and judiciary powers at the disposal of the capitalists in order to crush the workers. As early as 1913, Congressional investigation of the money trust, exposed the solidarity and unity of the capitalists. It was then shown that four great financial institutions in New York, held 89 directorships in trust companies and banks; 78 in tran- sportation systems; 49 in purchasing and trade companies; 29 in insurance companies; and 16 in public utility corporations. These four banks holding the 261 directorships were: J. P. Mor- gan & Co., the Guarantee Trust Co., The Bankers Trust Co., the First National Bank of New York. Also, the Chase National Bank of New York held 22 directorships in ten other large banks and trust companies. The National Bank of Commerce in New York had 57 directorships in 22 other large trust companies and banks which then had resources of over two billion dollars. Further proof of the solidarity and unity of the capitalists, is seen from the fact that the railroads and the U. S. Steel Corpora- tion own 75% of the anthracite and bituminous coal mines and completely control the output of coal. This centralized control is obtained through the following financial institutions: 19) American Federationist—October 1922—Page 739. 43 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER 1. J. P. Morgan & Co. 2. First National Bank of New York 3. Equitable Trust Co. 4. 3. 6. trol our transportation system and coal mines. Guaranty Trust Co. Equitable Life Assurance Association of U. S. Mutual Life Ins. Co. of N. Y. 7. American Surety Co. 8. 24 10. ods 12. 13. Mechanics & Metals National Bank National City Bank National Surety Co. N. Y. Trust Co. Chase National Bank U. S. Steel Corporation The men who control these great financial institutions con- The coal mines and railroads controlled by these institutions are: cE OONA NN & w WH 10. 11. 12. 13. operating 211,280 miles. Norfolk & Western Ry. . Western Maryland Ry. . Berwind-White Coal Mining Co. . Penn. Coal & Coke Corp. . Pennsylvania Railroad . Penn. Coal Company . Erie Railroad . Reading Company . Phil. & Reading Ry. Phil. & Reading Coal Co. Lehigh & Wilkes-Barre Coal Co. Central Railroad of N. J. Lehigh Valley Railroad 14 15. 16. 17; 18. £9; 20. 21. 22. 23. Lehigh Valley Coal Co. Delaware, Lackawanna & Western R. R. Delaware & Hudson Ry. Co. Coxe Bros. & Co. N. Y. Ontario & Western Rail- road Co. Maryland Coal Co. of West Virginia Pittsburgh Coal Co. Rocky Mountain Fuel Co. Chesapeake & Ohio R. R. Co. Virginia Railway Twenty-five men control 82% of the steam railway system These men divide amongst themselves 193 directorships—an average of nearly eight directorships a piece. railways. 1. Robert S. Lovett 6. H. S. Vanderbilt 7 2. Wm. Rockefeller 3. H. W. DeForest 8. L. P. Loree They are:?°) . Samuel Rea 4. A. H. Smith 9. A. J. County 5. G. F. Baker 10. A. W. Kraech 20) Representative 162, No. 91—Page 5328, March 31, 1922, They sit together on the board of directors of 99 class I 11. F. N. Davis 12. Fairfax Harrison 13. W. W. Atterbury 14. J. E. Reynolds. 15. Chas. Steele Edward E. Browne, Congressional Record, Vol. THE GREAT DEPRESSION 49 16. Howard Elliot 20. Julius Kruttschnitt 24. DeWitt Cuyler 17. M. H. Smith 21. Chas. E. Ingersoll 25. H. Walters 18. Chas. Hayden 22, E. A. Stotesbury 19. A. H. Harris 23. E. V. Thayer And testifying before the United States Senate Committee on Interstate Commerce on April 17, 1922, Mr. Jett W. Lauck, the noted economist, showed: “That the greater factors in American Industry, the railway equipment producers, the railway repair shops, the steel interests, the coal, cement and other basic material producers are closely bound together by inter-capital relations and interlocking directorates, coming to a focus in the banking house of Morgan & Co., and that the determination of their major policies cen- ters in and is controlled by a number of men scarcely larger than go to make up the administrative and exec- utive staff of the Federal Government.” The Outlook This was the line-up for the great conflict that was bound to come. In the strikes at the close of 1921, the workers began to show signs of effective resistance to the wage cutting and union- smashing onslaught of their employers and the Government. The capitalists and workers marshalled their forces for a battle to the bitter end. Among the working masses the feeling was that they had had enough of wage reductions and that their employ- ers had already driven them to the nethermost limits of endur- ance. The real fight came in the national strikes of 1922—the revolt of over a million workers in the textile mills, mines, and railway shops—the greatest strike wave in the history of the country. | CHAPTER III. THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT “Mounted Cavalrymen, infantrymen with fixed bayonets and Deputy Sheriffs swinging riot clubs oc- cupied every street corner in the village of Hope, which is owned by Goddard Brothers. . .”!)—The New York Times, March 9, 1922, Page 4. “We have been slaves long enough to the mill own- ers who have gone mad over their profits. “Rhode Island has been a fool’s paradise, a State of oppression and cod-fish aristocracy. We have been the slaves of an invisible power. “The workers sleep four in a bed and never have enough to eat, while the sleek members of the Kalon Club advise them to save their money.”?)—1bid, state- ment by John H. Powers, Blackstone Valley strike leader. ()* January 23rd the strike broke out in the Pawtucket Valley of Rhode Island. It spread like wildfire to the textile cen- ters of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Vermont. Between January 15 and February 15, at least one half of the New England cotton industry was tied up. Armed guards, hos- tile State and local administrations, and troops equipped with the most fiendish devices of modern warfare, only steeled the spirit and solidified the ranks of the workers. 1) N. Y. Times Investigation, March 9, 1922, page 4. 2) From statement to N. Y. Times investigator, by John H. Powers, leader of the strikers in the Blackstone Valley. 50 THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT o1 Goaded on by the fear of desperate want and intolerable working conditions and determined to challenge the unbridled tyranny of the textile barons, close to 100,000 workers deserted the mills. Italian, Polish, French, Canadian, Portuguese, Jewish and American workers, women, girls and men, organized and unorganizeed, spontaneously rallied to strike against the ukase of their employers for a wage reduction of 20% and a 54-hour week. Within sixteen months their wages had been cut 42%. Issues of the Strike The wage cut ordered by the mill owners was part and parcei of the general, concerted campaign of wage reductions instituted by the employers thruout the country. Bitter determination characterized the onslaught of the capitalists to rob the workers of the conditions won by them during the war. In New Hamp- shire the 48-hour week was established in February 1919. The textile barons were determined to deprive the workers of this gain. When the war was on the employers made fabulous pro- fits. They went mad overetheir gigantic dividends. In this at- tack on the workers, they were further emboldened by the help- lessness and timidity the workers presented in the last wage cut. Also, the capitalists were determined to nip in the bud any signs of preparation manifested by the workers. On December 2, 1921, eight independent unions merged in the Federated Textile Workers of America. During the war some textile operators had as many as three dividend periods a year. Even in 1921, the year of darkest depression, the Pacific Mills paid their stockholders enough dividends to advance the wages of the employees, at least 25%. In about a year this company paid $2,400,000 in dividends. The same rate was to be continued in 1922 and the workers were to pay this tribute by increased labor and decreased pay. This 52 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER company increased its capitalization by 33 1/3% in 1919. Yet, it is today paying dividends at the rate of 12%. The Pacific Mills were among the first to capitalize war profits by the now popular method of stock dividends. Another illustration of the gigantic profits reaped by the textile barons is seen in the finances of the Amoskeag Corpora- tion, the largest cotton mill in the world. This company made a net profit of $30,000,000 in ten years. In 1921 it paid its dividends at the rate of 75% on the capitalization of 1907. With- in the last 15 years it has put away a surplus of over $37,000,000 and has, besides, increased its capitalization from $4,000,000 to $44,500,000. Jerome C. Davis of Dartmouth, has thus pictured the “poverty” of the Amoskeag. “At the same time that the (Amoskeag) corpora- tion was reducing wages and increasing its hours, it had only a few months before increased dividends. Until January, 1912, the quarterly dividend on common stock was 7oc. From that date to April, 1919, it was $1.00. From February, 1920, to Mayg1l920, it was $1.25, and from February 1921, to the present time, it has been $1.50. In 1907 the company declared a 44% stock dividend. In 1919 three shares of common and two of preferred were exchanged in place of each single share. In 1919 there was a 100% stock dividend on the com- mon, so that since the organization there has been a con- tinual increase in the amount of stock and continual increase in the dividends on the increased number of shares. “The sum of $100 invested in the Amoskeag in 1897 would have been worth on the market today over $1,000 and would have received in dividends over $670. If a mill worker in 1897 would have been able to in- vest $500 in the stock of the company and had kept it, together with his dividends he would now have over $9,000. Said a Manchester Banker, ‘One thousand THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 53 dollars invested in Amoskeag in 1911 would have been worth on the market today over $8,500’.’) Professor Davis analyzes the problem very accurately when he says: <4 . . . This method is, first a constant increase of outstanding stock, a pyramiding of securities on which dividends must be paid; second, a tendency to increase the rate of dividends paid in prosperous years and a reluctance to decrease them in periods of depression. What makes this practice extremely unethical, is that prosperous years are used as the basis for inflation of securities and dividends. Subsequently, in periods of depression, the company has a choice between several alternatives. It can stop paying dividends which would reduce the value of its stock on the market; or it can take from surplus which might have the same effect; or it can reduce wages and increase hours, which will tend to increase stock values. The Amoskeag Corpora- tion has over $17,000,000 in United States Liberty Bonds. It has other quick assets which bring up the total to over $37,000,000. The company reports net quick assets of over $133 a share for the preferred. If the plant is included and each spindle is valued at $50—although now worth $75—each share of common has a book value of $333 a share. Yet the company says it is necessary to make some radical departure to meet Southern competition. The directors are unwilling to reduce either surplus or dividends. The result is that wages must be reduced and hours lengthened. In other words, during prosperity years, the capital side of the business is enormously increased, but in years of de- pression it is not correspondingly decreased. “This is true not alone for the Amoskeag Com- pany; it is a well-nigh universal phenomenon.) (Our Italics). 3) Jerome Davis, N. Y. Times Current History, October 1922, page 23. 4) Ibid, Page 23-24, from financial figures presented in “The Ameri- can Wool and Cotton Reporter.” 24 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER During the strike the workers repeatedly challenged the manufacturers to open their books to any chosen impartial body. The workers agreed to return to the mills immediately, if this body would find that a “fair” profit was endangered by a con- tinuation of the old wages and hours. The answer of the textile operators was a flat refusal. The agent of the Amoskeag is re- ported to have replied: “It is nothing but Socialism for a person to say that the public has any right to inquire as to how much money a firm makes or how much it lays by for ex- pansion.”>? The cry of these “poor” corporations that they must reduce wages and lengthen the working hours to meet Southern compe- tition, was just so much more sand thrown into the eyes of the workers. From the official figures of the American Cotton Manu- facturers’ Association, we find that the following were the weekly wage scales in the North and South in June, 1921: Grade of Worker North South Skilled male $21.78 $16.65 Unskilled male 18.08 10.99 Composite 18.71 13.99 Women 15.61 11.65 W. D. Adams, Secretary-Treasurer of the American Cotton Manufacturers’ Association, in a letter to E, F. Green, Treasurer of the Pacific Mills of Lawrence, pointed out that the wages of the Southern workers are on a par with those of the Northern, when the expense for the upkeep of the mill workers’ houses were added to the workers’ income. But he further said that the wages in the North should be higher “Because of the more rigorous Ae a 5) Ibid, page 24. THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT D0 climate, the lack of garden and truck facilities and additional compensation Southern operatives receive in Southern Mills due to comparatively free house rent, electric lights, water works and sewerage, cheap fuel and the like . . . as an item in the cost of production. I beg to say that a careful investigation by the Ameri- can Cotton Manufacturers’ Association determined the increased compensation of Southern mill operatives on account of village expense to be $4.36 per operative per week.” Thus the Southern wage was only about 35c less per week than the Northern wage was before the 20% wage cut was ordered. Also there is more regular employment in the South, because its market is more steady, for, as it has been pointed out by the Census Bureau in its study of the Textile Industry, the South turns out mainly such staple heavy cloths as, ginghams, staple calicoes, denims, drills, and heavy ducks. Furthermore, the individual output per worker per working day in the North is of a better quality and. greater quantity than in the South. Mr. Adams also ‘ad- mitted that the Southern owners would follow the example of the Northern manufacturers and cut wages. The workers would thus be in a vicious circle. The representatives of the workers pointed out that the wage cut of 20% would immediately give the Northern workers a lower wage than that of the Southern by from 8-22% depending on whether the 48-hour week would be maintained. In the hearing on the 48-hour bill before the Rhode Island Legislature it was proved that more than half of the cotton mill spindles are in Massachusetts where there is a 48-hour law in effect. Besides, a considerable portion of the capital of the New England and Southern mills is interlocked. For instance, the Consolidated Textile Corporation of New York owns 750,000 spindles in the South and this same Consolidated Company owns the only mills in New England which may be said to turn out goods that might meet Southern competition in the market: 56 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER The Workers—Slaves What made these huge profits possible? Who produced these dividends? The answer is: The starvation wages and the living and employment conditions forced upon the textile workers made these profits possible. The exploited workers created these dividends. Before this cut was announced, the yearly average wage, ac- cording to so conservative an authority as the National Industrial Conference Board, was $1,085.44. In November 1919 it had found that $1,385.79 per year was the minimum needed for a liv- ing in Lawrence, Mass. In October, 1919, it had found that a wage of $1,267.76 per year was the minimum needed in Fall Riv- er, Mass. Since then, it is true, the cost of living had dropped somewhat, but keeping in mind the 42% cut in wages made dur- ing the depression, it is obvious that the overwhelming majority of the textile workers were faced with living conditions far be- low the minimum levels set by the most conservative authorities. The New York Times investigator found that the average weekly wage of common labor was $15; semi-skilled and skilled labor $17 to $18. Only a few reached thirty dollars per week. Out of these earnings they often paid back to the company in rent as high as $25 to $30 per month. In many instances the mother, father, and one or two children were compelled to work in order to earn the bare necessities of life for the family. The Amalgamated Textile Workers engaged the Labor Bureau, Inc., to make a survey of the cotton industry regarding wages and profits. This competent authority, taking the share received by the workers in 1914 and the purchasing power of the textile workers’ dollar in that year as a basis, and assuming that the amount received then was sufficient, and that the worker had continuous employment, found that for the period of 1914. 1921 the cotton mill workers of the whole United States, fell $756,321,000 below the basis of “normalcy.” At the same time the corporations averaged profits at the rate of 29.6 per cent on THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT inflated capital. The Living Conditions A New York Times investigator making a survey of the strike had found that: Co. “There was evidence of unsanitary and deplorable living conditions everywhere. Several villages were en- tirely owned by the mill owners, who controlled every- thing, including the church that the workers went to worship in, and the ball park and fair grounds where they found amusement. “In practically every town, the mill owners check out the worker’s meagre pay from 75c. to $5 a week house rent and his milk bill, and in many instances his grocery bill, contracted in the company store.”®) Said one striker to this investigator: “We own nothing here (the village of Hope) except - our skin. The Goddards own every stick of wood in the village. They own the Methodist-Episcopal church over there, and Rev. Mary Sampson, their preacher, is telling us to go to work. The twenty-five that went back to work were members of her Congregation.” Jackson, the adjoining town, is owned by B. B. & R. Knight The New York Times investigator goes on to say: “After being shown some of the badly kept dwell- ings of the Knight Company workers for which they paid rents ranging from 75c. to $3.25 a week, the visi- - tors were shown the beautiful stock barns of the com- pany located on the hills overlooking the valley. “““Here you see beautiful cattle sheds’, said Mr. Flannigan. “They are electric-lighted, steam-heated, 6) N. Y. Times, March 9, 1922. 38 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER everything is sanitary and the cows are given attention by special attendants. ““They treat their cattle better than employees’.” The tyranny of the textile barons and their control of the local and State governments is at least as bad, if not worse, than in the steel and coal areas. In March 1921, the New York Globe engaged Mr. Wesley W. Stout to investigate the conditions in the textile area. His find- ings were substantially as follows: 1) The textile barons rule with an iron hand. Their dictatorship is as arrogant and rigorous as that of the feudal overlords. There is a vicious system of absentee ownership and “The mill owners exercise a feudal authority as complete as that of a medieval baron. This may explain why there were no labor unions in the Val- ley and no strikes.” Mr. Stout found that for one hun- dred and ten years, the Pawtucket Valley did not have a trade union, a lockout or a strike with exception of two localized affairs in the recent years. 2) In the strike area we have a veritable backwash of civilization worse than the slums of New York City. 3) Except for the supervisors, the workers still live in the houses set up by the predecessors of the pres- ent textile tyrants in 1810. “As the company houses do not appear on the . books as a profitable investment, the company paints, papers and repairs them as seldom as possible. As the companies own most of the property in each village, many of the villages have no sewerage system and only one or two a public water system. “There is no collection of garbage and rubbish. The windows are without screens, and wells adjoin hi- deous outhouses and stables. Oil lamps light these houses, the only change since 1810 being from whale oil to kerosene. In the older houses—most of those occupied by the poorer paid workers, antedate the Civil War and some date back a century. The roofs often THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 59 leak, the timbers are rotting, the walls ooze water, plas- ter is falling and the cracks are stopped up with soap or cotton waste.” 4) A vicious spy system is in force. Any worker who manifests the slightest spirit of protest, is exiled not only from the mills, but oftentimes from the village or Valley. 5) The textile barons, almost all of whom do not even live in the state, have chosen state legislators, con- gressmen, senators and governors. Of this condition, Professor Jerome Davis of Dartmouth College, said: “It might be noted at this point that the Amoskeag, in stating that its purse had ever. been ready to the up- building of the State and City, spoke the plain, unvar- nished truth, for outside of the Boston and Maine Rail- road there has been no power in the state which has been anywhere near so potent. As a matter of fact, all the directors of the corporation, with the exception of one, live outside the State, and that one spends his winters © in Florida. Senator Moses refused to talk with a union representative on the ground that he was not a citizen of New Hampshire. . . ”” The capitalists have devised the most cruel methods of sweat- ing their workers and intensifying exploitation. Every dollar of their profits is merely the congealed sweat and blood of their wage slaves. Apropos of this The New York Times investigator has said: “These efficiency experts go around the plant, time the work of various employees with a stop watch, and learn just how much work each man or woman can do in a day. After several tests, the ‘systematizers’ take the maximum efficiency record of the worker and set that as the daily standard that he must live up to. If it is 7) Current History, October 1922, page 22. 60 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER found that the worker has some spare time, he is com- pelled to aid in other work in order that every minute of his time in the mill may be taken up. Workers who decline to accept the standard set by the factory expert or fall behind the schedule are discharged, it is said.”®) The Workers Revolt. Against such unspeakable living and employment conditions the workers revolted. Despite overwhelming odds, the strikers put up an heroic struggle. They sprung a complete surprise on their employers, by the readiness with which they deserted the mills, the numbers that responded to the strike call and the length of time they were ready to stay out. In some localities, the strike lasted over thirty-five weeks. In some instances it is still being waged against the 54 hour week. The textile strike was the first strike since the “grand offensive” began where the workers displayed such a thrilling spirit of struggle and effective resistance to the enemy— their employers and their Government. Here is a description of the spread of the strike by a worker: “In the little village of Natick, there was a local of the Amalgamated Textile Workers of America. They succeeded in striking the big mill of the B. B. & R. Knight Company on the morning the cut was to go into effect. The strikers then marched to two adjoining mills and struck them. A speaker was sent from the Provi- dence local to the mass meeting of the strikers that af- ternoon. “The other workers are as anxious as you to resist this cut. Go ask them to join you,’ he said. The “Iron Battalion” was formed forthwith. The other mills were called upon and the whole of the Pawtucket Valley was tied up 100% in a few days. The Amal- gamated Textile Workers of America enrolled thous- ands of members. 8) N. Y. Times, March 10, 1922, page 5. THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 61 “In the adjoining Blackstone Valley, things went slower—not that the rank and file of the workers willed it so—but the red tape of the officialdom held them in check. In that Valley, the United Textile Workers of America have a few locals of different crafts or depart- ments. These naturally wanted their national officers to take the helm. But the International President was then sick and other ‘important’ incidents happened to hinder action, so that nearly two weeks went by before the mills in the Blackstone Valley started to come out. Their strike was not so prompt and clear cut as in the Pawtucket Valley, but eventually they tied up all the mills and established a solid front.’ One feature of the strike was the very effective picketing. In the Pawtucket Valley, the workers organized the “Iron Bat- talion”—a picket group of more than 200 strong. Most of these were ex-soldiers. This greatly heartened the workers at Natick. These workers would march up and down the sidewalks before the mills without saying a word. They would wave their hands and handkerchiefs to those within the mill’s stockade. They would also demonstrate before the State House for the 48-hour bill. How effective this picketing was is evidenced in the im- pression of The New York Times investigator. He said: “Undaunted by the presence of the soldiers, the Bat- talion now assembles every morning and marches thru Natick streets and to neighboring mills, led by a man swinging a bell. Singing, and swinging sticks and canes, the marchers generally keep up their parade until assured that no effort is being made to start the mills. Then they disband, leaving a few on picket duty ready to sound the alarm at the first attempt of any mill to operate. “Because of the threatening [the investigator un- doubtedly meant effective] tactics of the ‘Iron Battalion’ 9) W. E. Vinyarn, Labor Herald, April 1922, page 9. 62 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER which has become known from one end of the State to the other, the only machine gun company in the strike zone is in Natick where it has mounted guns on the roofs of the big mills.”?” John J. Thomas, leading the strike for the United Textile Workers, organized mass picketing and demonstrations of thous- ands. These “flying squadrons” as they were called were very effective and the employers howled to their protector, Governor San Souci of Rhode Island, that such picketing was illegal. The problem of feeding the workers was a gigantic one. The strikers did not have the savings to help them stay out so long. In the Pawtucket Valley, the Amalgamated Relief Com- mittee was feeding over six thousand daily. The United Textile Workers expended close to $750,000; most of which was donated by other unions. An illustration of this solidarity of the workers is seen in the following occurrence at the last convention of the United Textile Workers described by President McMahon. “Towards the latter moments of the Convention, or- ganizer Thomas presented two of our members who were shot down by gunmen at the Jenckes Spinning Company plant on the morning of February 21, 1922, in the pres- ence of the Mayor of the City of Pawtucket. “One with four fingers shot completely away on his right hand, and the other with his right side paralyzed for life, along with ten or twelve young girls who were shot and wounded in various parts of the body. “The convention was overwhelmed and a magnifi- cent donation by the delegates. many of whom were strikers, showed their keen sympathy. But this was not all. The delegates from the Full Fashioned Hosiery Knitters, Union 706, quickly got together and-selected a spokesman who requested the approximate cost of the operation that would be necessary to give the young man 10) N. Y. Times, March 9, 1922. THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 63 who was paralyzed, a fighting chance to be again re- stored to full physical manhood. “He was told that it would be approximately $1,000, and quickly the answer shot back: ‘Send him to the place selected for the operation and forward your bill of $1,000 to Local Union 706, Philadelphia’.”!) The co-operatives of New England also rendered considerable aid to the strikers. The Co-operative Bakeries of New Bedford, Lynn, Brockton, Worcester and Providence daily sent thousands of loaves of bread into the Pawtucket Valley. These bakeries were furnished with flour and huge quantities of cans of fruits and vegetables by the Purity Co-operative Association of Pater- son, N. J. . The New Textile Worker, official organ of the Amalgamated Textile Workers, in its review of the strike maintained that to more than anything else : “, . . the winning of this great strike is due to industrial unionism. Even in Manchester, New Hamp- shire, at the plant of the Amoskeag Company, where the strike was in charge of an organization that is not primarily industrial unionist in form or spirit, the strike was an industrial union strike—every worker in the mills was out. On any other basis it would have lasted six weeks, but would have ended quickly in de- feat.” The Government Fights the Battles of the Employers. The textile bosses had expected an easy victory. They had staked their bets on the organizational chaos in the ranks of the workers. But they were dazed by the fighting spirit of the work- ers. This imbued the employers with a fierce determination to win. Acute bitterness characterized their efforts to break the 11) Foes F. McMahon, President of the United Textile Workers of America in the Textile Worker, October, 1922. 64 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER strike. This bitterness and lust for vengeance was manifested by the degree to which they called on their government officials to break the strike for them and by the extent to which their local and State administrations gave them wholehearted support. A. THE COURTS Injunctions played their part very effectively. The courts were liberal in donating them to their masters—the textile barons. We cite the following model injunction of the strike procured by the Jenckes Company, Crown Manufacturing Company, and the Dexter Yarn Company to enjoin picketing in Rhode Island. On June 12, 1922, the Superior Court of Providence, R. I., on the basis of the Supreme Court decision in the case of the American Steel Foundries v. the Tri-city Central Trades Council granted the above corporations this injunction asked for and said: “Courts have recognized that some refined types of intimidation are far more effective than threatened physical violence. . . “The picketing in all these cases was in mass or group led by a captain selected or approved by union leader Thomas. . .” ; The court recites the fact that at first the pickets numbered hundreds, but “Later, under the Sheriff’s regime, the Jenckes group, consisting of thirty pickets every nine minutes marched around the plant; and at Dexter, 25 or 50 marched back and forth in two lines in front of the plant, so timing the march as to have the two lines meet in front of the entrance. . .” PO ES COTES aT i. SE BSS Desi A RT AO an The court branded this form of picketing as mass picketing and therefore declared it illegal and concluded by saying: THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 65 “In the Court’s opinion, the preliminary injunc- tion should run against all picketing.’”!?) Thomas F. McMahon was arrested at Manchester, New Hamp- shire, in contempt of court, on June 30 for violating the injunc- tion. The interference of the courts with the picketing which was very effective, was a severe blow to the striking workers and a great help to the greedy employers. It prolonged the strike for many weeks and thus intensified the suffering of the workers. The capitalists were drawing their dividends as usual. No court orders interfered with them. The textile bosses also called upon the courts to empower them to evict the strikers living in the company houses. Deputy Sheriffs began to serve eviction notices in the Pawtucket Valley on April 29th. From the following press item, we get an impression of the brutality of the officials of the employing class Government: “Providence, R. I., May 2.—Deputy Sheriffs re- moved today the houshold goods of August Van Leere, a Belgian citizen and a striker, from a hill tenement at Hope Village owned by the Hope Company, and left them on a public highway, a thousand feet away. Chief of Police Riley of Scituate, in which Hope Village is situated, declared that if the goods were not removed within 24 hours he would sell them at public auc- tion.””!) B. THE MILITARY FORCES Two troops of cavalry and a machine gun company were sent into the strike zone by Governor San Souci of Rhode Island at the request of the Crompton and B. B. & R. Knight Co., Inc.— the largest operators in the Pawtucket. The troops entered the 12) Law and Labor, July 1922. 13) New York Times, April 3, 1922, Page 25. 66 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER Valley on February 20th. On February 21st, on the eve of Wash- ington’s birthday, one sympathizer was killed, two were seriously wounded and five were less critically hurt by riot-gun fire at the mill of the Jenckes Spinning Company. Mayor Robert G. Ken- yon is charged with having directed this attack. | Subsequently, four companies of Coast Artillery were rushed to the Blackstone Valley. By March 7th, there were 600 Na- tional Guardsmen on strike duty in Rhode Island—five com- panies of coast artillery, two troops of cavalry, and a machine gun company. ‘This strikebreaking army was maintained by the Government at the cost of three thousand dollars a day from funds especially appropriated by the State Legislature for this purpose. On March 14th, Sheriff Jonathan Andrews put a ban on mass picketing in all of Providence County—Providence, Pawtucket and Woonsocket. To enforce this order the County Deputy Sheriffs were armed with repeating rifles to mow down the work- ers at their first attempt to prevent strikebreakers from taking their jobs. According to Sheriff Andrews’s own statement, the mill owners paid for the services of many of these deputies, a large number of whom had previously been discharged from the police force for unfitness. When several hundred Blackstone-Valley strikers attempted to arrange a demonstration before the Capitol in Providence in favor of the Lavander 48-hour Bill, Lieut.-Governor Harold J. Gross ordered them barred from the Senate Chamber and the galleries. “It was the first time, so far as State House attaches recalled, that such action had been taken.’ Only those with special cards from the Lieutenant-Governor were permitted to enter. No workers were present. 14) New York Times, April 1, 1922, Page 2. THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 3 67 How effective these strikebreaking measures instituted by the Government in behalf of the textile barons were, is evidenced by the following press dispatch: “Pawtucket, R. I.—Following the withdrawal of ... part of the armed guard ai the Brunel Textile Mill, two hundred and fifty strikebreakers working there de- clared a strike. The mill owners are reported to have sent to New York for men to replace the striking strike- breakers.””}5) Governor Cox of Massachusetts followed the example set by San Souci of Rhode Island and the Chief Executive of New Hampshire emulated both of them. On June 6th, 19 workers were arrested during a demonstration in front of the Amoskeag Mill. Open air meetings were prohibited. This strikebreaking order was subsequently amended to limit the open-air meetings only to those addressed by local speakers. In Manchester, strik- ers were prohibited from sitting on the porches of their homes and even from looking out of the windows while strikebreakers were going to and from the mill. Strikers were not permitted to talk to strikebreakers. But strikebreakers were allowed to heap upon strikers the vilest and most abusive insults. The strik- ers were not allowed to organize tag-days or house-to-house col- lections. The Government thus attempted to break the strike by statving out the workers. However, when the Amoskeag strike- breakers requested permission for holding a house-to-house can- vass to convince the strikers to return to work, the Governor gladly assented. C. THE BURNS DETECTIVE AGENCY TAKES A HAND Nor was the frame up neglected by the bosses. The infamous Burns of the Department of Justice came to their rescue. As late as September Ist, James D. Meehan of the Burns Agency 15) Federated Press Despatch, July 26, 1922. 68 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER of New York announced in the Providence Journal that: “Half a dozen suspects” are under surveillance. He said: “Arrests may soon be made.” His threats were based on the “findings” of his “bomb expert,” William E. Clark. Apropos of this attempt to frame up workers and terrify them into surrender, conducted by America’s most notorious detective agency at the head of which is the Head of the Bureau of Investigation of the United States Department of Justice, the Amalgamated Texyle Workers is- sued the following enlightening declaration which reads in part: “The Burns men, of whom there are many others scattered over the State, according to their own an- nouncement, refuse to tell who their clients are, but they claim to have been investigating the several explosions that have occurred in both the Blackstone and the Paw- tucket Valleys and a number of fires which they assert were incendiary. “These all took place several weeks ago. The ex- plosion that attracted most attention was that which oc- curred at the dam of the Flat River Reservoir at Co- ventry on June 12th. The explosive used there was so placed that in discharging it jammed the gate and abso- lutely precluded the possibility of water escaping. Had the gate been blown apart, millions of gallons of water would have flooded the Pawtucket Valley and inundated a dozen mill villages. “Leaders of the Amalgamated Textile Workers of America, conducting the Pawtucket Valley strike, pointed to this as bearing out the suspicion that the explosive had been placed there by agents or friends of the em- ployers. “On June 22nd a ‘queer’ explosion occurred at Crompton Village, in the Pawtucket Valley. It tore a hole in the ground in a vacant lot 35 feet from the Crompton Public Library. No damage was done to the ~ employer’s property, as the spot is 50 yards from the Crompton Velvet Mill. What made the exposion look to union officials like the bosses’ plant, was the addi- THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 69 tional fact that the harmless spot where it occurred was directly in the path of the army searchlight set up on the roof of the mill.” But despite this energetic and ferocious campaign waged by the Government in the strike area, the workers displayed a re- markable tenacity and held fast. Machine guns, coast artillery squads, riot guns, clubs, local and State administrations, and a church and press owned outright by the textile bosses, could not _awe the strikers. No. Not even the Government could break the strike! ad The Strike Settlements As the strike went on, it became a contest of endurance, a tug of war between the bread-hungry workers and the dividend- hungry capitalists. And in this fight the workers showed firmer resistance. In spite of the organizational chaos prevailing in the ranks of the workers, in spite of the bestiality characterizing the strikebreaking services of the Government, the strikers hurled back the onslaught and maintained their front. The first break came in Lawrence, Mass., the key to the tex- tile industry of New England. On August 28th, the Pacific and four other textile mills accepted a return to the old wage scale after a bitter struggle lasting nearly five months. Settlements followed in Rhode Island and the other centers. Some operators even raised wages above the pre-strike level. Discrimination against active strikers and insistence on a 54-hour week have de- layed settlements in several instances. The Unions and the Strike Spirited battles against oppression and exploitation are not new to the New England textile workers. The history of the class struggle in Lawrence is a story of unequalled sacrifice and almost superhuman heroism. 70 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER At the pitch of enthusiasm in their struggle, the union mem- bership would swell; then, it would wither away at an almost equal pace. Organizationally, the workers have been hopelessly divided. On the eve of the last strike there were at least fifteen unions in the field. Chief among these were the Amalgamated Textile Workers, the United Textile Workers, the One Big Union of Ben Legere, the Workers’ International Industrial Union, the Industrial Workers of the World, the American Federation of Textile Operatives and the National Loom Fixers Association. It is this canker of petty factionalism and extreme dualism afflicting the body-unionism of the textile workers that accounts for their meekness in accepting without any resistance the first wage cut of 2214%. It was the hope that the capitalists put in such rank division in the fold of the workers, that encouraged them to make another slash in wages and it was this dualism which kept the workers in a state of unpreparedness when the strike broke out. The strike in Lawrence, for instance, came two months after the outbreak in the Pawtucket Valley. Yet the workers there were unprepared when they did decide to fight. This condition is especially bad when one considers the fighting spirit of the workers involved. In Lawrence the internal wrangling was very costly to the workers. At the outset of the strike, unionism had a weak hold. And in this weakness, the workers were divided between the United Textile Workers and the One Big Union. For one week the two unions directed the strike thru a joint council. Then President McMahon, of the United Textile Workers grew tired of unity in the ranks of the workers, and withdrew from the council. Ben Legere of the One Big Union, went McMahon one worse. Instead of making an effort to heal the breach, he, in true dual unionist fashion, widened it. Throughout the strike he waged a bitter campaign in the press against the United Textile THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 71 Workers. Sharp recriminations and picketing of each others meetings, were only some of the attendant evils manifested. That the strike could have ended successfully weeks before it did, is evident from the very facts of the struggle. When the Pacific Mills, the largest in Lawrence, threw out feelers for a settlement, there was no single union representing the workers to deal with the owners. However, compelled by the very forces of the struggle, thére was again formed a joint council. This time it included the United Textile Workers, the National Loom Fixers’ Association, the One Big Union, and the American Feder- ation of Textile Operatives. At the mere announcement of this fe- deration, the textile barons declared the old wage scale restored without further negotiations. This backdown by the employers, came even before the workers could actually resort to practical joint action. The why and wherefore of this division in the ranks of the workers imbued with so valiant a fighting spirit is presented in the following view of the situation by the Labor Herald, official organ of the Trade Union Educational League. “This splendid spirit of the rank and file could have won the fight in short order, but for the criminal stupidity of the textile unions. When the need for a solid front was so apparent, the ‘leaders’ of the textile unions were guilty of keeping Labor’s forces divided. Each union tinkered with the fight in its own manner. No efforts were made to unite the workers of the Black- stone Valley with those of the Pawtucket Valley. In- ‘stead of healing the many divisions that existed thru- out the textile labor unions, the officialdom endeavored to intensify them.” 16) Labor Herald, November 1922—Page 21—‘‘Chaos in the Textile Industry” by H. J. C. | 72 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER Significance and Outlook The revolt of the textile workers was the first battle in the brilliant campaign of resistance, the giant strikes of 1922, against the savage offensive of the employing class aimed at lowering wages, raising the hours of labor and smashing the unions. When the textile workers rose to battle their exploiters, they were fight- ing not only their own fight, but the fight of all the workers as well. The remarkable struggle put up by the workers in this strike has had a buoyant effect on the militant spirit of all the workers. The textile strike, thru the very tenacity and determination of the workers, was the first important setback administered to the em- ployers in their anti-labor drive. As such, it is to be recorded as one of the most glorious battles in the annals of our labor history and one of the most heroic strikes waged by the workers in the United States. Temporarily, at least, the strike wave in the textile industry has subsided. There is a lull in the storm. However, a new storm, more furious, than the last one is on its way. ‘The textile barons, completely surprised by the magnificent resistance of the workers, and driven on by the fear of a loss of profits due to a shut-down during the present flurry of business prosperity, yielded and withdrew their order for lower pay and a. longer working day. But they are already preparing for the next battle. Mr. J. H. Tregoe, Executive Manager of the National Association of Credit Men, has aptly called the present peace merely an “emergency settlement.”!7) What shall the workers do? How shall they prepare for the coming struggle? The strike has greatly swelled the ranks of the unions. The little organization they had at the outbreak of the strike has been greatly strengthened. The time to learn from the mistakes of 17) New York Times, October 9, 1922. THE TEXTILE WORKERS REVOLT 73 the past is now. It is urgent that the workers immediately lay the basis for unity of action in peace and in war. The proposal following, that of the Trade Union Educational League, is prac- tical and necessary: “If ever there was need for amalgamation and the fusing together of unions, that need is now in the tex- tile industry. This needed unity can only be achieved if the rank and file in the industry get busy and demand it. “That should be the immediate program of every live union man in the textile unions.””!®) And what the workers can expect from the Government in such a struggle is obvious. The full military and judiciary forces of the Government, the powerfully organized brutality and violence in the form of courts and armed strikebreakers in and out of uniform, will be unleashed against the workers. The strikebreaking record of the Government in this textile strike is noteworthy for its blackness and sinister recklessness. Because of this vicious alignment of dollar and bayonet, textile overlords and robed tyrants, the need for a united front is greater than ever before. To send small, poorly armed bands against the serried ranks of the employing class and its protec- tors, armed to the teeth with all the hellish devices of modern warfare, would be suicide—stupid and criminal. The workers must pit unity against unity—then victory will be theirs, 18) Labor Herald—June 1922, Page 29, CHAPTER IV. THE MINERS ON STRIKE—AN ARMY AT WAR “... Finally, these men, already harassed and un- able to earn a wage to live, as distinct from a living wage, left their work when their existing insufficient incomes were slashed and a hope for improved condi- tions for themselves and their babies was flatly denied them. “Scores of these miners, poverty-stricken and un- able to go thru the coming winter unless help is given them, poured out such tales of suffering and mistreat- ment as would melt any heart except that in the stony bosom of a coal baron. We have seen in the tents, in the hencoops, and in the stables where the miners and their families sought shelter after having been sum- marily evicted from their homes by the coal and iron police, hungry babies and women whose feet were bare and bleeding and whose limbs were thinly clad. . . “No Egyptian Pharoah, rearing for his glory a tow- ering monument, ever drove men harder than these min- ers were driven. No Czar was ever more autocratic than these predatory interests of big business.”)) (Our Italics). Wa miners strike, there is fight. And when miners fight there is war! Hostile State and Federal Governments, armed strikebreakers in and out of uniform, injunctions, gun- men, forced marches, evictions, legalized murder, and jails fill 1) From the Report on Conditions in Somerset County, Pa., by the New York Municipal Investigating Committee, David Hirschfield, Director of Accounts, New York, Chairman. 74. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 75 the annals of the heroic struggles waged by the mine workers of America against capitalist exploitation and oppression. Clearing the Ground. Over 600,000 coal miners “downed tools” on April 1, 1922, in protest against drastic wage-reductions and degrading working conditions. The coal-operators picked the Spring of 1922 as the most appropriate moment for launching their campaign to crush the union. From every point of view this was a favorable time to them for a showdown. First of all, there were on April 1, according to the Report of the Director of the United States Geological Survey, 63 mil- lion tons"of bituminous coal on hand. This was a quantity suf- ficient for 55 days. With the summer months coming, this sup- ply looked big enough to the Operators to afford a chance to reap swollen profits on famine prices for a period longer than the workers could hope to stay out. They also counted on non- union miners to augment the supply sufficiently and continuously. The Operators were further emboldened by the fact that there were then over 4,000,000 unemployed. They counted on being able to recruit a vast horde of strikebreakers from this gigantic industrial reserve army. Besides, the coal magnates believed the union itself was in bad shape. Its treasury had been drained by costly litigation in the courts and the Mingo struggle of twenty-eight months entailing an expenditure of nearly $2,000,000. | For these reasons the mine owners were anxious to force a strike on the workers at this time. For the same reasons the miners. were equally anxious to avoid a strike. And for these very reasons the Government was anxious to help the Operators in their union-smashing plans by refusing to take any steps to prevent the strike. Despite the fact that it, the Government it- 76 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER self, was a party to the agreement of 1920 providing for ar- bitration, it, the Government itself, not only didn’t prevent the Operators from violating the contract—an instrument that is officially sacred only when it can be turned against the work- ers—but even went out of its way totally to forget its own con- tractual obligations. Months before the outbreak of the strike it was plain that this would be the Government’s policy towards the strike issue in the mines. Congressman Huddleston pointed this out very clearly in January, 1922.2) And the Washington Herald said: “That a strike would seem inevitable in the bi- tuminous fields at the expiration of the miners’ present national agreement, March 31, is the belief of Secre- tary Hoover. If the bituminous miners walk out; say labor leaders, the anthracite miners will follow them, throwing 500,000 men into the strike. ““There seems little possibility,’ Secretary Hoover said, ‘that any machinery might be set up to avoid the strike. The Government has taken no further steps to avoid the walkout. Unless something unforeseen oc- curs to adjust the difficulty, it seems that the stage is set for a strike.’ “The Government’s position has long been known to be that sooner or later there would have to be a show- down in the mine fields. Jts attitude is that if a strike must be, it must be, and the sooner the issue is dis- posed of, the better.”*) (Our Italics). In this officially inspired interview, in a paper whose inter- ests are largely controlled by Hoover himself, the cat is let out of the bag. The Government, like the Operators, wanted to see the strike come at this time. 2) Congressional Record, January 21, 1922, page 1715. 3) Washington Herald, January 20, 1922. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 77 Breaking the Agreement. In March 1920, at the urgent solicitation of the Government through the Bituminous Coal Commission, the miners and Opera- tors entered into an agreement which, among other things, pro- vided for the holding of an Interstate Joint Conference prior to April 1, 1922, to adjust differences. This section read: “Resolved that an Interstate Joint Conference should be held prior to April 1, 1922; the time and place for holding such meeting to be referred to a com- mittee of the Operators and two members from each State herein represented, together with the Internation- al officials of the United Mine Workers of America.” This agreement covered the Central Competitive Field— Western Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Bound by this agreement, President Lewis of the United Mine Workers, as early as December 1921, called on the Operators to meet in Pittsburgh in January. This invitation the operators turned down. A simi- lar fate befell his February request for a meeting with represen- tatives of the miners to be held in Cleveland on March 2 in order to negotiate another two-year agreement. Thus, though con- tract-bound, many Operators spurned the call. Other Operators were ready to meet only District representatives and enter into local agreements. This policy was aimed at dividing the work- ers. The Operators knew that it would be much easier to op- press the miners if they were to face them divided than if they were to deal with them as one big unit on a national scale. The miners would not fall for this trap of their exploiters. Anent the breaking of this agreement even Secretary of Labor Davis, an un-hyphenated, one hundred per cent member of Harding’s Cabinet has been compelled to state that: “In fairness it must be said that the miners’ off- cials were willing and ready to go into the Conference 78 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER agreed upon, but some of the Operators declined to meet. “The Operators and miners were bound to a Con- ference; that this Conference might have led to a new agreement, and the country might not have been con- fronted with a stoppage of coal production, a suspen- sion avoided, ample supplies of coal and a gradual re- duction of prices would have resulted. “I cannot but express keen disappointment at the failure of certain Operators to fulfill the terms of their obligation to meet in Conference with a view to peace in the coal industry for two years more.” In the face of this admission, the subsequent attitude and conduct of the Government throughout the mine strike is a lesson painful to the memory but most worthy of being learned. On the Eve of the Struggle Since 1896 the agreement in the Central Competitive Field has served as the basic wage agreement for the entire bituminous coal industry. Many Operators ordered wage reductions ranging from 20 to 40 per cent. They ordered that the check-off system be dis- continued. The loss of the check-off would have dealt a mortal blow to unionism in the mining industry. The Operators knew this and they were therefore bent on abolishing this procedure. As Mr. Thomas H. Watkins, President of the Pennsylvania Coal and Coke Corporation, has said: “The check-off means collection by the operators, from the mine workers’ pay envelopes, of dues and as- sessments levied by the union. This the Operators con- sidered illegal and immoral, as the funds so collected were used to create a war chest for fighting the union Operators, and particularly for financing the miners’ 4) Congressional Record, Vol. No. 91, p. 5328, March 31, 1922. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 79 campaign for unionizing the balance of the coal fields of the country. The question is still undecided as to the Operators’ liability in being a party to collecting . these dues when any part of them is used to finance a campaign which interferes with the operations of non- union producers.”®) (Our Italics). As usual the capitalists here also find that unionization and a solidifying of the workers’ ranks are illegal and immoral. In reply, the miners demanded that the Basic Central Com- petitive Field Agreement, the check-off and the existing scale of wages continue. They also demanded a six-hour day, that is from “bank to bank,” inclusive of all the time spent in the mine, and a five-day week. This proposal was in effect only a plea for more steady employment, as the miners suffer severely from acute irregularity of employment. On March 15 a conference was held in New York City with the anthracite Operators and a request was made for a 20 per cent wage increase and the renewal of the contract which expired on March 31. The negotiations failed. The Operators “indig- nantly and vigorously” rejected the proposals of the workers and the anthracite miners fell in line with their brothers of the bi- - tuminous fields to strike on April 1st. The Sirike Begins. Hundreds of thousands of miners, anthracite and bituminous, unorganized as well as organized, left the pits on April 1. For the first time in their history the miners gave battle to their enemy on practically the entire national front. Especially inspiring was the conduct of the non-union bituminous miners. They answered the strike call en masse and flocked into the unions by the thousands. In the non-union fields controlled mainly by the United States Steel Corporation, in Fayette, Greene, and West- 5) New York Times Current History, November 1922, page 216. 80 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER moreland Counties of Western Pennsylvania, production was almost totally stopped. It was the heroic spirit ahd unflinching class loyalty of these unorganized miners that surprised the union men as well as the Operators and actually turned the tide in the struggle. How this unexpected but most needed and welcomed sup- port was obtained is vividly described in the Labor Herald by John Dorsey. “The Connellsville coke region had resisted unioni- zation for years; the H. C. Frick Company was a dictator of that region, and fixed wages, hours and working con- ditions. Feeney (an organizer of the U. M. W. of A.) laid his plans long in advance to pull this section of the miners out. Six weeks before the strike, he sent groups of picked men from the union fields into the Connellsville region to look for work. The companies were putting on more forces in anticipation of the strike. They thought these men were deserters from the union, looking for a job where the strike would not affect them, and gladly put them to work. But they were experienced organizers, men who knew how to do their work without the accompaniment of a brass band. The result was that when the strike came, tens of thous- ands of the supposedly non-union miners walked out with the union men, and immediately joined the organi- zation.”®) | Within two weeks after the strike was declared 35,000 of these previously unorganized miners joined the union in Western Pennsylvania, District 5 of the United Mine Workers of America. As the struggle went on the pre-strike talk of separate District agreements dabbled in by Farrington, President of the Illinois Miners, subsided. Much to the disappointment of the Operators. the miners did not brook any such talk and presented a united front along the whole line. 6) John Dorsey in the Labor Herald, May 1922, Page 4. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 81 By the middle of July the Department of Labor found that 610,000 out of a total of 795,000 miners were on strike. In the anthracite fields of Pennsylvania the 155,000 anthracite miners struck one hundred per cent, and only 20,000 out of the 175,000 bituminous miners remained at work. In the Standard Oil Prin- cipality of Colorado and in the Steel Trust Barony of West Vir- ginia thousands deserted the mines. In the face of an Anti- Strike Law 13,000 out of the total of 14,000 struck in Kansas. The miners of Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Montana, New Mexico, Ohio and Texas quit to a man. In so far as numbers and solidarity go this was the greatest strike that America has witnessed. It was the second great industrial strike in America, the Great Steel Strike of 1919 being the first. Another Comparison. The coal industry, like all other industries under capitalism, is running on the basis of having the worker turn out sufficient dividends to cover every period of the year, employment~and unemployment, deflation and inflation, depression and prosperity. No matter what name the capitalist experts give to the conditions of exploitation forced upon the workers, it remains an indisput- able fact that when the workingmen labor they must be contented with receiving little enough to permit a continuous flow of divi- dends. Any other condition, the official “economists” label as “abnormalcy.” This is the pith of the problem in every strike, in every struggle of the workers. But with the workers, the story is entirely different. When they work they get barely enough to maintain themselves anywhere near the minimum level of subsistence. When they are unemployed—they must starve. Today, industries are not considered prosperous on the basis of the workers receiving what is due to them. The sole basis of evaluating the “soundness” of an industry today is whether there is a steady flow of dividends into the pockets of the 82 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER capitalists who -do nothing for a living except own, that is possess title to some means of production or exchange—a title guaran- teed by the full military and judiciary power of the State. This condition is particularly aggravated in the coal in- dustry. During the war the Operators were veritable ghouls. They ran riot in their profit-garnering. Said Wm. G. McAdoo, ex-Secretary of the Treasury: “The coal operators assert that I gave out con- fidential information when I stated that profits of the mine owners in 1917 ranged from 15 to 2000 per cent on capital stock before deduction of taxes. This was not confidential information. The Treasury Depart- ment may publish statistical matter of this sort at any time... In short, many coal Operators got back their entire invested capital several times out of their pro- fits in 1917, as shown by the reports, and must now be on velvet.””) As the war went on and the workers were dying on the battlefields of France and Flanders the merry dance of profits went on. The Federal Trade Commission found that: “Twenty-one companies in the smokeless fields of West Virginia produced in 1919, 6,664,502 and in the first nine months of 1920, 5,019,327 tons. . . “The rate of return of the individual companies | making up this group of 21 ranges in 1919 from a loss of 24 per cent on the investment for one company to a profit of 45 per cent. for another company. For the first nine months of 1920 the range of return on invest- ment was from a profit of 3 per cent. for one company to a profit of 268 per cent. for another company. The company making the profit of 268 per cent. was the same company which in 1919 had a loss of 24 per cent. 7) Associated ‘Press Despatch, Philadelphia Public Ledger, November * 28, 1919, . THE MINERS ON STRIKE 83 The estimated annual rate for the whole of 1920 ranged from 4 per cent to 357 per cent on investment.’®) The above percentages are all based on the figures submitted by the coal operators themselves. The names of the individual operators are completely withheld and shielded from public knowledge. But even this condition did not.suit the Operators. They were determined to deny their much-beloved “public” even the sparse, inadequate information of the above character. The Na- tional Coal Association, representing about 60 per cent of the coal operators of the country, called upon the courts to compel the Federal Trade Commission to discontinue the investigation. Said the Commission: “The reason for the incompleteness of the Com- mission’s information and for the necessity of relying on the National Coal Association’s unrevised costs for the three years’ period lies in the fact that an injunction was eranted against the Commission by the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia on April 19, 1920, in the case of Maynard Coal Company against the Commission, wherein the Court’s opinion held that the Commission was ‘demanding information as to inter- state commerce and as to coal production,’ and that, ‘no such visitorial power as tlrat claimed by the Com- mission in the instant case has been vested in Congress by the Constitution, nor could Congress delegate such power to the Commission’. “Shortly thereafter 22 steel companies brought similar proceedings against the Commission touching its requirements, both as to steel and coal trade. In this case a permanent injunction was issued on March 10, 1922, by the same Court that issued the pene in the Maynard case. 8) Senate Document No. 207-——Part 2, Page 29. Submitted to 67th Congress, May 31, 1922, 84 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER “These proceedings and injunctions stopped the Commission’s activities in the collection and publica- tion of information as to coal and other basic commo- dities which the Commission, as a measure to abate the high cost of living, undertook to compile and pub- lish currently, beginning 1920. . .””°) Now, when Congress investigates profits, the commodity in question, in this case it happened to be coal, is not an article involved in interstate commerce. But when a State attempts to investigate profits, the same commodity, at the touch of a robed alchemist, instantly becomes an article involved in inter- state commerce as described by Congressman Newton of Min- nesota: “About the same time the Regulatory Commission of the State of Indiana issued an order to certain coal companies requiring them to file with the State author- ities a statement of the cost of mining coal. The Nation- al Coal Association, or some of its members, contested this order on the ground that the entire output of these mines would go largely into interstate commerce and was wholly without jurisdiction of the State of Indiana, and that only the Federal Government had the juris- diction to require such information. . . “The National Coal Association and its members have, by these two proceedings, placed the public in a sort of constitutional ‘no man’s land’, where it is being shot at from both sides through the levying of increased prices for this necessity of life.’ How helpless the Government is when it attempts to pry into the secrets of its master, the employing class, is admitted by the wealthy ex-Senator Frelinghuysen, who confessed that “The coal lobby has tied the Government’s hands and poked out 9) Ibid—Pages 2-3. 10) See Congressional Record, Vol. 62, No. 71, page 4033, March 8, 1922. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 85 its eyes.” What a poor, weak Government we have when the interests of the capitalists are involved in the slightest way. Really, mercy yells for help in this case! This great power of the Coal Trust stands out in bold relief when we look at a cross section of its organization. The an- thracite industry, for instance, is a closed corporation. Eight companies which not only mine coal but also own the railroads hauling the coal within these fields control approximately 75 per cent of the output. These are: 1) The Hudson Coal Co. 2) The Lackawanna & Western Railroad Co. 3) The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Co. 4) The Lehigh Valley Coal Co. (including Coxe Bros. & Co.) . 5) The Lehigh & Wilkes-Barre Coal Co. 6) The Pennsylvania Coal Co. (including Hillside Coal & Iron Co.) 7) Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Co. 8) The Scranton Coal Co. These eight companies had a combined production of 73.4 per cent. of the total anthracite produced in 1919. Such a condition prevails in the entire coal industry, though not as acutely in the bituminous industry. We find that the United States Steel Corporation and the Railroads own almost 75 per cent of both the anthracite and bituminous coal fields. They control the output of coal through thirteen of the leading financial institutions.") The U.S. Steel Corporation controls the Federal Steel Cor- poration of New Jersey, which owns the Illinois Steel Co. which 11) See Congressional Record, Vol. 62, No. 91, page 5328, March 31, 1922. 86 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER in turn owns all the stock ($2,000,000) of a company appearing in the open as the United States Coal & Coke Co.” It is evident that Mammon, the God of .-today, like his predecessor Jehovah, the God of yesterday, also has his Bible— especially when we consider the “begetting” process. These are the exploiters of the coal miners. These are the same capitalists who exploit the steel workers, the railroad workers, and millions of other workers. It is for these Steel and Coal Barons, and Rail and Money Lords that the American workers are grinding out profits. It is because of the burden- some tribute paid to these capitalists that the miners are working for such small pay and under such degrading conditions. The Wages and W orking Conditions The capitalist class has been doing a tremendous amount of howling over the “high”, the “excessive” wages of the miners. Such noise is the grossest outrage perpetrated on truth. According to the findings of so conservative a Congressman as Representative Bland of Indiana the mine workers’ earnings average as follows for 1921: Average Days District Worked in 1921 Average Earnings Ohiotien sac ees 119 $550 Pittsburgh i252. - 123 762 West Virginia ... 80 500 In Tennessee, one third of the workers averaged one third time and earned $105 per month per man when at work.) Further- more the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ has pointed out that: 12) United States of America, Appellant, Vs. U. S. Steel Co. et al., Supreme Court Term, October Term 1916, No. 481. Brief for the Appel- lant, pages 755-6. 13) See Congressional Record, March 17, 1922. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 87 “At the hearings on the Bland Bill before the House Committee on Labor, Mr. John Brophy, Presi- dent of District No. 2, Central Pennsylvania, present- ed data which he had gathered on the earnings of 31,979 mine workers in Central Pennsylvania for the year 1921. The average for the year for all of the miners in the territory covered was $760 or $14.60 per week. The average amount of operation for all the mines in which these workers were employed was 122 days.) For the period of June 1, 1918, to May 31, 1919—a period in which the coal operators made profits running into thousands of per cent. the Department of Labor found that 95.6 per cent of the mine workers in an anthracite community earned less than $1850; 63 per cent. less than $1250 and 16.6 per cent. less than $850 per year. Of the latter, 91.8 per cent reported unemploy- ment; of those earning between $850 and $1250, 83.9 per cent. reported unemployment; and 55.7 per cent of those earning be- tween $1250 and $1850 reported unemployment.) Also, Mr. Basil Manly has pointed out that: “In the mining regions only one-third of the famil- ies are entirely supported by the earnings of the hus- band, while the other two thirds are dependent for subsistence on the supplementary income derived from ~ the labor of the wife and the children or by keeping boarders and lodgers.”?° And here follows an actual case in the Cossack-ridden State of Pennsylvania: “My husband was a night watchman,’ said Mrs. Beal. ‘He worked twelve hours a night and seven nights 14) Bulletin No. 2, Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in Amer- ica, “The Coal Controversy”—Page 25. 15) Bulletin Number 106, Department of Labor, “Child Labor and the Welfare of Children in an Anthracite Coal Mining District,” 1922, p. 29. 16) Are Wages Too High? By Basil Manly, Page 17. 88 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER a week and his monthly salary before April 1 was $147.50. He was cut $37.50 in April, but never knew it until he tried to draw his pay. My husband has worked several years for the company. Every two weeks, on pay day, he drew $1 in cash, The rest of his salary we deducted for groceries and other articles that we were forced to buy at the company store.’ ” When asked by the questioner, Commissioner Hirschfield, what she did with the dollar, the woman replied: “T usually gave it to our doctor... I paid him by the week for his services in attending me when I had my babies. I then got through paying one bill when I had my last child. A few weeks later we were evicted from the company house.’ ” To the question of the Commissioner as to where the family had been living since the eviction the woman answered: “In a washhouse, ten feet square. Five of us sleep in one bed.’ 7) It is through such low wages that the Lehigh & Wilkes-Barre Coal Co. has been able to increase its surplus from 1912-1920 nearly 900 per cent—from $3,500,000 to $27,000,000, and paid dividends as high as 305 per cent; that the Temple Coal Co. increased the net income on its capital stock from 29.3 per cent. in 1912 to 121 per cent. in 1920; that the Lehigh Valley Coal Co. was able to increase the value of its property from $5,500,000 to $12,000,000, reduced its bonded debt from $20,000,000 to $11,500,000 and pay dividends of 190 per cent; and that the Philadelphia & Reading Coal Co. increased its surplus by 1700 - per cent., from $1,500,000 in 1912 to $25,000,000 in 1920, and 17) Associated Press Despatch, New York World, November “a 1922, quoting testimony given before the N. Y. Municipal Coal Investigating Committee. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 89 increased the value of its property from $9,500,000 to $33,500,000 —an increase of 360 per cent.!®) Yet the Operators were yelling poverty and insisted on re- ducing the already grossly inadequate wages by from 20 to 40 per cent. Because of these starvation wages many children are com- pelled to work and thus denied even an elementary schooling according to the U. S. Department of Labor. “Of the 3136 children between 13-16 years of age who were included in this study, 1349 had left school for regular employment. At the time of the investiga- tion, 1332 were so employed, and 296 were employed at vacation or after-school work, or both; so that more than half, 51.9 per cent., of the children could be de- scribed as working children. Of these 1,107 were boys and 521 girls.”}9) And the working conditions are no less intolerable for these boys and girls than they are for their fathers. As one worker said to the investigator: “If you don’t die you wind up in the breakers. You begin at the breaker and you end at the breaker, broken yourself.” Working Conditions Irregularity of employment is one of the worst diseases afflicting the miner’s life. It means aggravated unemployment for him. The miner cannot know today whether there will be work for him tomorrow. Many times, at the whistle’s call of “work” in the evening and the morning, the miner will rise at four in the niorning, set himself ready for work, walk more than five miles to the pit, and then be informed that there is nothing 18) Speech of Representative Newton, Minn., Congressional Record, March 8, 1922, page 4040. 19) Department of Labor Bulletin No. 106, page 1) 90 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER doing because the Railroad Company had failed to furnish empty cars. Picturing these conditions before Congress, Representative Ricketts of Ohio, said: “Men working in this district (Crooksville) never have an opportunity to straighten themselves or straight- en their backs during the day until they go out of the mine in the evening unless they choose to lie flat on the floor or bottom of the mine. They enter the mine in the morning and sometimes they have to walk for miles in a stooped position to their work. They are frequent- ly compelled to go through mud and water in order to reach their work.”°) Pneumonia, consumption and colds are not uncommon amongst the miners. They are continually exposed to gas and dust explosions, to the falling of slate and coal, mine damp, fire, drowning and electrocution. Denial of sunlight and fresh air accompany the starvation wage of the miner in his hard lot. In 1921, despite severe unemployment, the toll of. killed in the mines was 1,973 according to the report of the Bureau of Mines. 7 Here is a description of working conditions for boys and men in an anthracite district from the findings of the U. S. Department of Labor: “These older men and boys worked in the con- stant roar which the coal makes as it rushes down the chute, is broken in the crushing machines, or sorted in the shakers. Black coal dust is everywhere, cover- ing the windows and filling the air and the lungs of the workers. The slate is so sharp that the slate pick- ers of ten cut or bruise their hands; the coal is carried down the chute in water and this means sore and swol- len hands for the pickers. The first few weeks after 20) Congressional Record Vol. 62, page 5698. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 91 a boy begins work his fingers bleed almost continu- ously and are called red tops by the other boys.’2!) And despite all this the American miner is the most pro- ductive in the world, as shown by the Christian Science Monitor investigation. “The American miner as the greatest per capita output of any miner in the world. The production per man increased from 579 tons in 1890 to 942 tons in 1918. The British worker manages to get only 250 tons a year, or three and three-quarters times less.”22) Yet, what are the rewards of the miner, the worker who actually takes his life into his own hands every time he steps into the pit, the worker who digs the coal? Answering this question the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ says: “The indication points to an annual wage lower by $430.45 than the minimum budget necessary for a workingman’s family as compiled by the National In- dustrial Conference Board (an employers’ organiza- tion) for Detroit, Michigan, September 1921. This is their most recent cost budget and it totals $1697.95.”9) The prevailing conditions on the eve of the strike were forcefully told by Elmer O. Pettit, for eight years a Common Pleas Judge in the Hocking Valley District of Ohio. It was sent to Representative Ricketts of that State on March 25, 1922. “Distress among the coal miners in Hocking Coun- ty is alarming and I am informed that similar condi- tions exist in Perry and Athens Counties. In Hocking County the coal producing area, as you know, is 21) U. S. Department of Labor, Bulletin No. 106, page 16. 22) Report of Investigator, appearing in Christian Science Monitor, Nov. 17, 1922. 23) “The Coal Controversy,” page 25 (Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America). 92 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER somewhat limited; yet a careful survey made by the committee on relief for this county, of which I am chairman, shows that there are in our County alone 127 families, comprising in all 725 persons, who are in absolute need of food... “It seems now certain that there will be a strike commencing on April 1, and there will be no work at all at the mines. For the last sixteen months or more there has been but little work for these people, and until recently they lived upon their savings, what little they were able to earn, and the union allowances. The picture is dark enough without going further... . “T have no doubt that many of them have suffered because they were too proud to make known their con- dition. . .”4) The Strike in Full Swing Imbued with an intense hatred of these abominable working and living conditions, the miners, long in the front ranks of the American trade unionists, presented an impregnable line against their enemy—the united army of the Operators and their Government agents. They displayed unheard of solidarity in the face of the indescribable brutality of the forces arrayed against them. Despite extensive troop movements and the un- divided support given to the Operators by the Government, after its expectations as to an early defeat of the miners proved en- tirely unfounded, the heroic strikers fought on. The reserve supply of coal was exhausted. The non-union production did not come anywhere near the hopes of the Operators and their Government henchmen. The Government soon became con- vinced that bayonets could be used only for murdering working- men—but never for digging coal. The miners knew their opponents. They knew the determin- ation of their bosses to make them pay the cost of depression 24) Congressional Record, Vol. 62, No. 96, page 5696. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 93 in order to continue the steady flow of dividends for those who do nothing for a living except own. Whatever attempt at hiring strikebreakers that was made by the Operators with the assist- ance of the Government turned out to be a fizzle. At Herrin, the miners showed that they could not be overwhelmed by armies of gunmen and they rose in heroic defense of their lives and jobs. After the struggle at Herrin the production of non- union coal fell off by almost 50 per cent. This incident aroused a desire for savage revenge among the capitalists. From the Stock Exchange in Wall Street to the White House in the Capital the cry for capitalist justice—merci- less retribution for the punishment administered to the gunmen at Herrin—was most frantically echoed. But the answer of the miners was greater solidarity. A miners’ strike is a war. It covers a front of hundreds of miles and involves hundreds of thousands of men. In this miners’ war, as in any other modern war, the problem of. food is most important. An army of miners on strike like an army of attack must have food. The commissary division of the United Mine Workers has long ago won its spurs in action. In this problem of food, however, it is the women who bear the brunt of the burden. It is they who must answer the call of the famished infant and the starving child for bread. The wives of the miners play a role of great significance in determining the morale of the miners. And in this bitter struggle the wives of the miners did not falter or fail for even a moment, as the Labor Age well said: “Back of the great fight put up by the miners is the heroic loyalty of the miners’ wives. . . “In the late Great Mine War they went cheerfully into the tent colonies. They gave birth to children in the open fields. They cooked without sufficient water, because the companies in several places cvt off their 94 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER supply. They were driven out of their homes at night with no place to go. They were subject to the insults of the State Constabulary and mine guards—and in some instances were assaulted and raped by these thugs. “Their sufferings made possible the united front.” Strike Deadly Effective As the strike went on its effect on industry became more and more paralyzing. This situation, aggravated by the strike of the railway shopmen, was rapidly driving the country head- long to a standstill in industry. The reserve supplies held in store by the thousands of cor- porations throughout the country were steadily being exhausted. The steel industry was confronted with a condition whereby it could not weather a few days of severe weather. Henry Ford issued an order to close his plants and wired the thousands of companies selling him accessories in the following words: “On account of coal we will be unable to operate our plants after Saturday, September 16. No material will be accepted if shipped other than mentioned in letter following.” In New York, the United Real Estate Owners’ Association, announced on August 27th, that its survey indicated that of its eleven thousand members only a “few coal users have coal for more than a month’s use.” Despite the fact .that through the arrangements of the Shipping Board the importation of British coal was intensified, the pinch was beginning to be felt very severely. Plans were considered to convert the skyscrapers and the giant office buildings of New York from coal into oil burners. ; 25) Labor Age, Oct. 1922, page 23. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 95 The Government Runs to the Rescue of the Operators After two months of struggle the Government made a com- plete right about face in its strike policy. It became convinced that the showdown which, back in January, it was so anxious to force on the workers did not develop at it hoped. From the very moment that the occurrence of the strike became a matter of fact the Government showed where it stood. When the strike be- came so effective as to gnaw into the dividends of the huge cor- porations, the Government openly dropped its hands-off policy. The Government clenched its fists, it showed its teeth, and the workers felt its heavy military and judiciary hands grip their throat. The Government was bent on breaking the strike or at least saving its poor Operators from an ignominious defeat at the hands of the fighting miners whose only crime was that they had dared challenge the right of their bosses to drive them further down the road of misery and starvation. Injunctions as usual were the first aid rendered to the capitalists by their Government. These injunctions were of the most sweeping character, as pointed out by Mr. Searles, editor of the United Mines Workers’ Journal: “Dozens of such injunctions were issued by West Virginia Courts. They were of the most drastic char- acter, making it impossible for union miners to meet together, discuss the strike or aid or assist those on strike. The collection of the check-off was prohibited by injunction. Every possible activity was made im- possible. The result was that these injunctions broke the strike in some places, as it was intended they should, and the strike, to some degree, failed there. It was a clear case of driving unwilling men back to work with injunction writs, . .”6 26) N. Y. Times Current History, Ellis Searles, Nov. 1922, page 220. 96 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER In Pennsylvania the local Government was especially ener- getic in smashing the union and oppressing the workers, accord- ing to Mr. Hays of the Civil Liberties Union: “The coal and iron police, mounted and heavily armed, acting under the directions of the coal company, permit no one to stand for a moment on the streets, and greet arrivals with threats of arrest, obscene language and physical violence. . . “We identified the police who had assaulted us and the company officials who had given them orders, and I was on my way to the Justice of Peace, (at Vinton- dale) who was holding court in the Coal company’s office, when I was arrested on the charge of trespass- ing. I was seized by two troopers who threw me into a filthy cell. . . “When I appeared before the Justice of the Peace he informed me that he would hear my case. He asked me if I was ready for trial, and when I replied in the affirmative, his answer was: ‘Guilty; I fine you Five Dollars.’ I protested at this and he then announced that he would suspend the fine on condition that I would leave the town. When I refused to leave Vintondale and demanded a hearing, he then stated that the case was concluded; that I was not guilty and would not be fined, and he and the company left me alone in the court room. “This terrorizing of citizens on the part of the coal and iron police is no mere incident of the strike. The coal companies have exercised complete control over the civil authorities of Vintondale and other mining towns for many years. They employ their own police- men; they close post offices, eject visitors from the towns, and hold court in their own offices. . .”? (Our Italics). This is a capitalist dictatorship—a rule of the employing class, by the employing class and for the employing class in the 27) Report of Arthur Garfield Hays, investigating mining conditions for the Civil Liberties Union. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 97 “democratic” commonwealth of the great Keystone State. And discussing the coal situation Representative Thomas of Ken- tucky made it plain that: “West Virginia is without a Republican form of Government, and about the only law executed in that State is the will of the Guggenheim and similar inter- ests which have adjusted wages downwards until the wages of most miners in the State are less than $300 a year. . 78) The employers were not content with the free use of State troops. They maintained their own armies and had an elaborate private spy system. These gangmen of the capitalists will resort to any tactics against the workers. Describing the results of these methods the N. Y. World said: “An elaborate system of espionage was developed and pretexts were found for jailing organizers. Auto- mobiles full of armed guards were in ambush near the Lincoln Highway, and when cars containing organ- izers passed they were followed so closely that they could not stop without danger of a crash. Court records filled up with homicide cases, in which a major- ity of decisions favored the company representatives. There were grave charges of perjury and injustice in the courts. . .”? And the Journal of the Locomotive Firemen and Enginemen cites this case: ¢ “A large body of women gathered and urged the men not to return to work. The uniformed guards at the plant rounded up the women and running out a line of fire hose prepared to drench them. The sight of 28) Congressional Record, Vol. 62, No. 92, page 5414. 29) N. Y¥. World, October 15, 1922, Elizabeth Houghton, Staff Cor- respondent. 98 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER the hose, reports to the county authorities said, threw the women into a panic, some of them becoming hyster- ICAL ah eee In the President’s own State of Ohio the situation for the workers was just as bad. The iron rule of the mine bosses was supreme, as the following report of a local miners’ defense committee shows: “Bellaire, Ohio.—Dan Agosti, one of the thirteen miners who were indicted in the New Laferty, Ohio, trouble between miners and strikebreakers was found guilty of murder in the second degree last week. “‘Agosti is the second one to be tried in this case. Another, Dominick Venturato, President of a miners’ local in District 6, United Mine Workers, was tried in August and found guilty of murder in the first degree. “Agosti, Venturato, and eleven others were held for the death of John L. Major, a non-union operator. Major and a party of strikebreakers came upon a mass meeting of striking miners at New Laferty, Ohio, on the morning of June 27th last. Someone from among the miners that gathered around their machine opened fire and Major was killed. “Subsequent to many arrests, thirteen miners were indicted on charges of conspiracy, including Robert Farmer, a Vice-President of Sub-District Number 5 of District Number 6. The trial of Agosti was character- ized by the adverse rulings of the Judge, particularly in the selection of jurors, and withethe result that those who might have been counted on as fair, were disquali- fied. One woman juror was dismissed because her hus- band worked in a mine, although she qualified in every other way. It is also the source of much complaint that this Judge, whose name is Cowen, selected the jury venire from a class who were strongly prejudiced 30) Report from the Collier Mine, H. C. Frick Co.—Locomotive Fire- men and Enginemen’s Journal, Sept. 15, 1922. THE MINERS ON STRIKE against the defendants, over the repeated protests of the attorneys for the defense. “Strange to say, this same judge and the special prosecutor in the case were, at one time, while law ‘partners, the attorneys for the miners’ union in this vicinity, but were removed by a convention of the Sub- District. . .2!) (Qur Italics). 99 Yes. Many strange things do happen when the capitalists demand the blood of their innocent workers—and when their demand is made good by the employers’ government. Evictions and intimidation of the most unbridled character according to the following findings of Powers Hapgood. “The coal companies in all these counties have served five-day eviction notices on a great many of their employees, hoping by that means to intimidate the men to come back to work under non-union conditions. In many instances deputy sheriffs employed by the coal companies have even thrown families and their furni- ture right out on the road before the union was able to supply them with tents. , “In Somerset County in the month of April there were 347 new deputy sheriffs commissioned by the sheriff of Somerset County. The wages of these deputy sheriffs were paid by the coal companies who asked the sheriff to deputize them. The sheriff received $1 per day for each deputy that he commissioned for the com- pany.... “When a miner who is unable to speak English or defend himself in Court is arrested he is usually found guilty of the trumped-up charges which the mine guards bring against them, even though they be entire- ly innocent. “Not only were the union men often put in jail for doing nothing at all, but in numerous instances they have proved a powerful weapon in the hands of the Operators, 31) Bulletin of the Miners’ Defense Committee, Sub. Dist. 5. Diet. 6, U. M. W. of A. 100 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER were brutally handled. The most notable case of this treatment is the Jerome Mine of the Hillman Coal and Coke Co. Here several men who merely asked some im- ported strikebreakers if they did not know there was a strike on were beaten over the head and shoulders with blackjacks by the mine guards and then put in jail and charged with inciting to riot. ene And if by chance the coal companies did-not own some land used by evicted strikers, they always found the means fur- ther to browbeat their workers. An investigator of the New York World has shown that: “Land has been bought up from the neighboring farmers to prevent the establishment of tent colonies. Tony Neri, an Italian farmer, was offered $5000 for a farm worth $1000 (his own evaluation), when he re- fused to forbid a strike meeting being held there.”33) Harding Dons the Strikebreaker’s Uniform We have seen how the Government pursued a “hands-off” policy before the strike because it believed a the workers would be decisively beaten. : When the strike was in full swing, Harding, as chief spokes- man of the Government developed a strong policy—that is a crushing policy against the workers. After admitting that he was unable to compel the strikers to accept “arbitration”, he issued a public declaration condemning the valiant miners who had been fighting for nineteen weeks for refusing to surrender. He again urged all Operators to resume mining under the pro- tection of the bayonets of the Government troops. He said in his strikebreaking message of August 18th: 32) Report of Conditions in Coal Fields by Powers Hapgood. 33) New York World, October 15, 1922. Elizabeth Houghton, Staff Correspondent. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 101 “The simple but significant truth was revealed that except for such coal as comes from the districts worked by unorganized miners, the country is at the mercy of the United Mine Workers.” To the President as to every other strikebreaker, as to every other capitalist agent, a union becomes a criminal organization when it becomes strong enough to challenge the power of the employers ruthlessly to exploit and oppress the workers. No such words were used by Harding when the Operators and the Government itself broke a contract with the miners because they thought the time for exterminating the union was ripe. Then, as a servant of the employers, Harding was not even aware that there was a strike problem in the coal fields. But once the strike was on, Harding turned his rostrum into a cesspool of lying propaganda for the Operators. In the same strikebreak- ing message he delivered this sample of imagination run amuck: “Governors in various States report that their Operators and miners had no dispute and were eager to resume production. District leaders informed me that their workmen were anxious to return to their jobs, but that they were not permitted to do so. Hundreds of wives of workmen have addressed the White House beseeching a settlement, alleging that they knew no erievance.” “Our” President is really running to the defense of out- raged innocence. The women, the wives of the workers, who were clubbed, drenched, insulted, and evicted had no grievance. Truth yells for help. Nearly every mining State had troops, in addition to the Deputy Sheriffs and private gunmen, defend the “right to work” —of the strikebreakers. As per Harding’s orders the flag was unfurled at the mines by the Governors of many States. But not even Warren Gamaliel Harding could use the flag as a means 102 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER of blindfolding the workers when it was used openly to serve as a screen behind which the strikebreakers were ordered to hide. How this policy has failed was well told by Mr. Searles: “Governor Sproul of Pennsylvania sent eleven hundred soldiers into the bituminous fields of Western Pennsylvania to guard the army of men that was to flock back to the mines, but the army did not flock. A few strikebreakers were imported into the mines, but the production of coal did not increase. Operators were unable to deliver on their promise of production under military protection. Governor McCray of In- diana sent a thousand soldiers into the mining field of that State, where they remained for several weeks, and in all that time there was produced about 1600 tons of coal at a cost to the State of approximately $100 to $150 a ton, including the cost of the ano display. Other States had a similar experience. . .”4) Profiteering Rampant While Harding was fretting about the country being at the mercy of the United Mine Workers, the Government through its Department of Justice was giving a free rein to the Operators who could supply coal to charge to their pockets’ delight. In his strikebreaking message already mentioned the Chief Execu- tive spoke very tenderly and appreciatively, to say the least, of the noble “conscience” of these public-minded Operators. “The Administration earnestly has sought to re- strain profiteering and to secure the rightful distribu- tion of such coal as has been available in this emer- gency. There were no legal powers for price control. There has been cordial co-operation in many fields, a fine revelation of business conscience, stronger than the temptation to profit by a people’s misfortune.” 34) N. Y. Times Current History, November 1922, page 220. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 103 It is interesting to note that when it comes to controlling the Operators from unbridled reckless plunder our worthy Presi- dent relies on the conscience of these conscienceless ghouls, but when a struggle of starving oppressed workers is considered the President rushes troops, implores courts, and threatens new legislation to break the strike. Henry Ford charged that the Railroads and the coal cor- porations were in an agreement to raise the coal prices. “There is no use trying to balk them, and I, for one, am tired of trying,” he said. And Governor Edwards of New Jersey was forced to appeal to Governor Sproul of Pennsylvania to do something as the anthracite Operators were turning fixed maximum prices into ever-rising minimum prices. In his telegram of October 6th to Governor Sproul, the Governor of New Jersey said: “Complaints are coming daily to our New Jersey * Fuel Commission from retail dealers of the insistence by independent Operators in charging as high as $14.50, or $6 in excess of the maximum price per ton fixed by yourself and your State Commission as the price of anthracite coal at the mines. “Cannot something be done to remedy this situa- tion in time for us to assure the public of the propor- tion of the supply allocated to New Jersey by your State Commission in accordance with the fair price to which they were led to believe coal would be secured through our co-operation with the authorities of Pennsylvania and the Federal Government ?**? This helplessness of the Government to control the prices of coal except through an appeal to “conscience”, while it was expending all its energies to break the ranks of the strikers, was country-wide. Apropos of this condition the Farmer-Labor Record of North Dakota reported: 35) New York Globe, October 6, 1922. } 104 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER “According to J. H. Calderhead, Secretary of the State Board of Railroad Commissioners, who has just returned from a trip to Chicago, Cleveland, and Buf- falo, the coal Operators of the Eastern and Middle- Western States are paying absolutely no attention to the Government’s attempt to prevent profiteering on the price of coal. “The Government fixed a price of from’ $3.65 to $4.80 per ton on the coal, depending on the location and quality, but the coal Operators are charging all the traffic will bear and the price of coal in Cleveland today is around $11.25 per ton, three dollars higher than it was ever known to be in the city’s history.’*® After Harding promised Federal protection to strikebreakers in the mines, Hoover was appointed to “control” prices for the “public”. How well Hoover acted in behalf of the employers is seen from the following in a letter sent by Senator Borah to the Coal Controller: “T find, according to my investigation the following quotations on coal: 1922 District Market Quoted April3 August 7 Smokeless mine run __ Boston $4.65 $9.50 Pool 11 (low volatile) Philadelphia 1.90 8.25 Somerset mine run Boston 2.00 7.50 Pool 54-64 (gas and steam) Philadelphia 1.00: O25 West Virginia Screenings Cincinnati 1.35 7.00 Pittsburgh No. 8 run Cleveland 1.85 8.00 West Kentucky mine run Louisville 1.90 8.00 Kansas Screenings Kansas City © 2.50 5.50 “Coat Acre” InpEx Spot Prices April 3—$1.71; June 8—$2.55; August 7—$5.11 Average Spot Price, April 3—$2.06 Average Spot Price, August 7—$6.18 36) Farmer-Labor State Record, Bismarck, North Dakota, October 19, 1922. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 105 “In adition to that, I have a great number of letters from people in different parts of the country advising me that they had contracts for coal at from $1.75 to $2.15 and that the contracts were disregarded and their prices fixed at $3.50 and up. . .” We see then that the Government was not satisfied with breaking the miners’ strike. It did not stop here. The Govern- ment went out of its way to oppress the other workingmen by giving the capitalists a free hand in raising the price of coal. And then—the Government yelled about the country being at the mercy of the United Mine Workers of America! Negotiating an Armed Truce Having succeeded in creating a coal shortage, in withdraw- ing an overwhelming number of hitherto unorganized miners from work, and in repelling the onslaught of the Government forces, the United Mine Workers forced the Operators into con- ference. As early as July 1 the Government saw that its cal- culations as to the outcome of the mine strike were a bit astray. Harding then called a conference attended by representatives of the miners and Operators. This Washington Conference broke up because the coal magnates insisted on District agreements. Then, Hoover, who was gaining a reputation in “fixing” the public as far as prices were concerned, came across with a plan for arbitration. A majority of the miners and Operators rejected this scheme. The miners were on to the arbitration game of their employers. The rank deal handed them by the Bituminous Com- mission in 1920 and the outrageous treatment accorded the shop- hands by the Railway Labor Board were still fresh in the memo- ries of the striking miners. So strong was the resentment of the rank and file against such a traitorous surrender that not even their leaders dared perpetrate the crime. All of Harding’s thunderbolts and denunciations and threats and violence did not 106 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER avail. The workers were adamant. The official stand of the union was thus summed up by the United Mine Workers’ Journal: “Arbitration as a means of settlement of a labor controversy robs the workers of the right to bargain for the sale of their own services. It takes from them all of the means which they now possess for their own protection against oppressive conditions on the part of their employers. . . It has been the bitter experience of the workers of this country .that they get the worst of it when they agree to the arbitration of their wages or working conditions by outside agencies.” But in early August came the first break in the ranks of the Operators for peace. On August 15th, at Cleveland, Operat- ors representing about 10 per cent of the tonnage signed up with the union. By Labor Day all the union bituminous miners were at work except several thousand men in the Kanawha Valley of West Virginia and those deserted by the leaders in Pennsylvania. Substantially the terms were as follows: 1. The old wage scale and working conditions shall prevail until March 31, 1923. 2. A representative, national conference of the entire bituminous industry shall meet in Cleveland, October 2, to set up a machinery for drawing up an agreement to take effect April 1, 1922. 3. This Conference shall elect a fact finding commis- sion to investigate the industry. 4. This Committee is to report its findings to a nation- al Conference to be held on January 3, 1923. Though the settlement was not achieved thru the medium of one national conference, the various arrangements came with such rapidity that in effect it was national. The wage re-, duction campaign of the Operators and their attack on the check-off failed. The miners succeeded in repelling an on- THE MINERS ON STRIKE 107 slaught on their wages and working conditions by offering heroic resistance thru five months of the most bitier struggle against overwhelming odds. 7 In the anthracite fields the siruggle was prolonged for a few weeks. On September 3 an agreement was reached. ‘This was ratified by the miners in conference at Wilkes-Barre, Penn- sylvania, on September 9th. The miners retained the old wage scale, defeated the attempts to set up a machinery for spurious arbitration, set up an investigation Committee, and secured an agreement to continue the pre-strike wages and working condi- tions until August 31, 1923. The Operators failed in their at- tempt to cut wages by 21%. That the miners saved themselves from a humiliating de- feat when they threw back into Harding’s face his plan for “arbitration” was later completely proven. In accordance with the provisions of the Borah-Winslow Coal Bill, Harding ap- pointed a “Fact-Finding.Commission”. “Our” President rejected all ideas of partisanship in his appointments. He did not ap- point a single representative of the miners on the Committee. In view of his mistreatment of the pubtsc when it came to fixing the price of coal, Harding decided to atone for his sins. He decided to let the “public” only be represented on this “fact- finding” committee. Let us acquaint ourselves a bit with some of these defenders of the public. | First comes John Hays Hammond, the chairman, a million- aire mining engineer. He is a close associate of the Guggenheim interests, the dictators of West Virginia. George Otis Smith, Chief‘ of the United States Geological Survey, is a professional politician and a regular contributor to the “Coal Age”, official organ of the National Coal Association, Chas. P. Neill, once U. S. Commissioner of Labor, is in the same class. Ex-Vice- President Marshall is a Democrat in good standing as a labor hater, Judge Samuel Alschuler of Chicago is the representative 108 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER of the public who complacently stood by while the Packers defied his Arbitration Board and slaughtered their workers. And last, to add a touch of “humanity” to the farce, Harding has included in his committee, Edward 7. Devine, a professional charity worker who turns out “social service” for the Rockefeller interests. The personnel of this committee should convince Harding at least, if nobody else, that it is folly “to recognize classes in America”. We wonder. But we also know. And so does Wall Street. The plan followed by Harding in the choice of this Committee is exactly the one desired by the capitalists for arbi- trating starvation wages into effect in the railway industry. Significance of the Strike The miners have scored a partial victory. Their strike was the most gigantic industrial strike in the history of America. The miners succeeded in repelling the capitalist offensive against their union. This has had an invigorating effect on the whole labor movement. The strike of the railway shopmen preventing the shipments of coal from the non-union areas, coupled with the magnificent solidarity and heroism of a large number of these former non-union miners themselves made the victory pos- sible. Today, after months of severe struggle, the mine workers’ union is much stronger not only in numbers but also in mili- tancy. The miners have been baptized in the fires of the battle and they have emerged from the struggle an army that has been through it thick and thin and has poured hell into the enemy— into the very white of his eyes. But the victory of the miners is not decisive. It is at best a truce. The victory is only an armed truce. The preparations for the coming struggle are already in the making—by both sides; that is the workers on the one side, and the Operators and THE MINERS ON STRIKE 109 the Government on the other. The point of view of Mr. Watkins of the Pennsylvania Coal and Coke Corporation is typical. “Tt can be clearly seen that the Cleveland Confer- ence resulted in only a provisional agreement or ar- mistice. . . It leaves all the principles involved as to check-off, working conditions and future methods of making wage agreements in abeyance during the period in which the commission is making its inquiry and re- commendations.’*”) The Conference between the miners and the bituminous Operators has ended in a deadlock. The Operators have flatly rejected the Central Competitive Field system and the January Conference will go into session without any basis of negotiation being arrived at. The employers are bent upon dividing the workers. They are bent on district agreements. To this demand the miners have turned a face of flint. They are presenting an adamant front. The Bureaucratic Leaders Betray the Workers. In paying our homage to the valiant fighters of the miners’ union we should not omit to condemn roundly the treason of their bureaucratic leaders. The Cleveland agreement did not take into consideration the heroic strikers of the Fayette region of Pennsylvania. This agreement disregarded the interests of the brave miners of Connellsville, Westmoreland, and Somerset —all former non-union districts of Pennsylvania. It must be remembered that it was the unflinching spirit of revolt, the 100 per cent. strike of these unorganized miners who rallied to the call of the Union, that made it possible for the United Mine Workers to beat back the savage attack of the coal Barons. 37) Thomas H. Watkins, President Pennsylvania Coal & Coke Cor- poration in N. Y. Times Current History, November 1922, page 217. 110 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER This treachery is portrayed in a statement of the rank and file miners of Pennsylvania. “Immediately after the Cleveland agreement, con- ferences were held in Pittsburgh for District No. 5, but not only did the District Executive Board ignore the coke field miners, but in at least one case signed a contract with the Hillman Coal and Coke Co. for only those mines near Pittsburgh and did not require to sign for their mines in Fayette County. While treach- ery of this kind is more or less familiar to all acquainted with the history of the United Mine Workers’ settle- ment, yet in view of the tremendous services rendered the union by the Fayette County strikers, this was a par- ticularly nasty betrayal. “Not only was the Fayette region left out of the settlement, but they were even abandoned so far as the relief was concerned. After a six months’ strike whole- sale evictions with starvation, and death from exposure facing tens of thousands of helpless men, women and children, no definite action for relief has been taken nor has even a definite promise of action been given. “Over 5000 evictions have occurred since June Ist in this district. Thousands are facing cold, foggy nights in flimsy tents with very little food and no winter cloth- ing. Typhoid fever is raging in several of the camps, prospective mothers have not adequate shelter, and many miners’ children are only escaping death thru being cared for in the homes of Pittsburgh workers. The situation is desperate. . .*8 This is the reward of loyalty to the working class, to the bravest of the brave in the miners’ war, when the reactionary leaders do the rewarding. How differently these bureaucrats reward treason to the workers, treason to the striking miners. Let us return to the 38) Bulletin of the Publicity Committee of the Miners’ Group, District 5, U. M. W. in Labor Herald, November 1922, page 8. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 11] recent struggle for our testimony. When Farrington, President of District 12, spoke of separate agreements he was severely condemned by all the miners. Even Lewis condemned Farring- ton. But the latter at that time was a political opponent of Lewis. If this were not so, Lewis would very likely have done very much less talking. In Alabama there was a separate agree- ment and an appointee of Lewis did the trick as narrated in the Labor Herald by John Dorsey. “It happened this way: A man who was once Inter- national President of the Union, John P. White, was put on the pay-roll at an outrageous salary, and sent to Alabama, one of the weakly organized districts. White was head of the Union at the outbreak of the war; he continued to draw his salary from the miners, while he went to Washington to serve the Government at $1 a _ year. Then he got a good government job, and he was succeeded by Lewis as President of the U. M. W. of A. But in some way White lost out, so Lewis, for unknown reasons, put him on the job again for the union. White went to Alabama, signed up separate agreements which tied up the miners under an arbitration board whose decisions they were bound to accept, and then resigned the position of—head of the arbitration board.” The whole settlement was a compromise in so far as settling the fundamental issues of the struggle. And from the point of view of the next struggle, the miners got the short end of the deal. Said Mr. Dorsey: “Those of us who have battled for years in the United Mine Workers of America knew that an attempt was due for a compromise. Both the Operators and the officials of the Union had good reasons to come to- gether. The Operators were licked. If the union had held out another month we could have dictated our own terms. And the officials wanted a compromise, be- 39) John Dorsey in the Labor Herald. October 1922. pages 19-20. 112 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER cause nominations for election of officers to the union were due—and they needed a platform to run for of- fice on, the platform of ‘we saved your old wage scale for you’. When the miners heard of the Cleveland meeting called by Lewis, a group of old timers met in one of the Illinois towns and talked it over. We all agreed on an outline of what we thought would be done there. Our agreement fitted the actual outcome like a tailor-made suit. So there wasn’t much surprise, al- though much bitter feeling arises at the thought that this splendid battle has brought only a quarter-vic- LOFYR ie wee Unless unforeseen circumstances intervene the miners will pay the price for their Pyrrhic victory and the treachery of their leaders when their next test of strength comes. We can rely on the President’s “public” investigation com- mittee to recommend deflation under some name or other, but actually it will be the deflating of the workers’ wages. The excuse will be that the public must be protected against high prices of coal and that the industry—bituminous coal mining is over- capitalized to pay sufficient dividends. Therefore wages must be cut. This propaganda will be spread far and wide by the Opera- tors and their Government and many workers will turn against the miners if they will resist a wage cut. The Union is confronted with serious court suits of a most costly nature. The Coronado decision is yet to be paid for by the trade unions of America in general and the miners’ union in particular. The Herrin defense will also drain the miners’ treasury. The miners will thus financially be even weaker than they were on the eve of the last strike. But the capitalists, as has been shown, are now charging more for coal than ever be- fore. They will be well prepared for the coming conflict. 40) Ibid., Page 19. THE MINERS ON STRIKE 113 Our Shipping Board took a hand in facilitating the impor- tation of coal last summer. Experience is the best teacher— even for a Government strikebreaking agency. We can safely leave it to our Shipping Board, subsidy or no subsidy, to improve in this strikebreaking activity. Finally, the anthracite miners are tied down by contract to work five months after a strike declaration by the bituminous workers. This will further make impossible a coal shortage. It will further paralyze the power of the strikers. The miners will be hard pressed in the next strike and it will be up to the rank and file to goad their leaders into a strong campaign of unioni- zation to avoid disaster. Anent this situation the Labor Herald well says: “The one factor which can enable the bosses to cut wages next Spring is the unorganized districts. West Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama, Colorado, and other out- lying fields, have been neglected by the union for po- litical and other reasons. If Lewis would only send the ‘organizers’ who-are idling around the hotels in districts already organized 100%, down into these un- organized fields with the word that they would be fired instantly unless they began to show results, the mines of the country would be organized completely before Spring. ; “The trouble is that the administration deliberate- ly keeps these districts partly unorganized so that they will be dependent upon the assistance of the na- tional office. . .”4)) _ Thus are the lives of hundreds of thousands of workers and their wives and children only pawns in the hands of unscrupulous bureaucrats—at the mercy of leaders who are pettier even than their petty purposes. | 41) Ibid.. pages 20 and 32. 114 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER Conclusion. The stone-wall defense of the miners, like the brilliant re- sistance of the textile workers checked the capitalist drive against the workers’ unions. These two battles put new courage into the hearts of the workingmen. The employers have been com- pelled to withdraw to reform their lines. But the workers must be better prepared than ever for the new conflicts. They must take account of their past struggles. They must not forget the lessons of these two gigantic battles. In the miners’ strike, as in the textile strike, the workers fought against almost insurmo-ntable obstacles. They not only had to face the highly organized offensive of their employers, but they also had to reckon with a leadership which refused to fight and which refused to pursue a victory to the complete end. Above all, the workingmen were confronted by a strike- breaking agency that had at its command soldiers armed with the most modern devices of fiendish destruction and a great number of robed tyrants sitting in courts and condemning the workers to jails and penal servitude—the Government. CHAPTER V. HERRIN—A LESSON IN AMERICAN CLASS WAR “We, the jury, find that the deaths were due to the acts, direct and indirect, of the officials of the South- ern Illinois Coal Company. We recommend that in- vestigation be conducted for the purpose of fixing the blame upon the individuals responsible.”—From the Report of the Coroner’s Jury. * ae history of the struggles of the American working class is _a history replete with incidents of heroic resistance to the brutal tyranny of the ruling class—the employing class. Many a page in the annals of the American labor movement has been written in blood— in the blood of the workingmen—written by the Government’s soldiers preserving the law and order of profits. But American capitalists are notorious for their greed. They are not satisfied with merely having the military forces of their Government at their beck and call. Many corporations maintain their own private armies of depraved gunmen. West Virginia, Colorado, the Steel towns of Pennsylvania, and the coal fields of the same State afford a superabundance of ruthlessness with which these private armies rule the domains of Steel and Coal. In the very heyday of their power and in the very limit of their brutality the mercenaries of the feudal tyrants did not exceed their American successors of the Twentieth Century. Cabin Creek, Pine Creek, Nashua, and Ludlow are gory monuments to the lust of American capitalism. 115 116 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER The story of Herrin is a story of the revolt of striking miners against the privately armed gunmen, thugs, detectives. The echoes of Herrin resounding from the press and pulpit, from the legislature and the schoolroom, are frantic shrieks merging into an hysterical chorus for barbaric revenge—for merciless retribution. Strikebreakers have given their lives on the altar of profits. The workers must pay. They must pay in blood. The Facts of the Case In Williamson County, in the State of Illinois, between the towns of Marion and Herrin, there is a strip mine operated by the Southern Illinois Coal Company. In the midst of the coal strike this company entered into an agreement with the union permitting it to “strip” the earth from veins of coal which were close enough to the surface to be mined without difficulty. This permission was granted by the Union in order to facilitate the resumption of operations when the strike would be settled. Mr. Lester, President of the Southern Illinois Coal Co., promised that he would make no attempt to mine coal until the end of the strike. But early in June the agreement was violated by the Company, as told by Congressman Denison representing the Congressional district in which Herrin is located. “‘As soon as the company had stripped the coal and removed the dirt and completed their other preliminary work they discharged the union labor and imported something like fifty non-union men from Chicago and began mining and marketing the coal contrary to their agreement with the miners. . .”)) On the tenth of June there arrived armed guards from the notorious strikebreaking concern of Chicago known as the Har- 1) Representative Denison in Congress, Quoted in “Labor”, July 1, 1922, page 3. HERRIN—A LESSON IN AMERICAN CLASS WAR 117 graves Detective Agency. These mercenaries of the Coal Barons were under the command of C. K. McDowell, a gunman who had “seen service” on the battlefields of Colorado. The testimony of the coroner’s jury shows that despite this violation of the agreement by the operators, the strikers did not interfere with production. But the presence of the gunmen made the situation critical. According to the findings of Major Samuel N. Hunter, personal representative of Governor Small, who investigated the situation for the Governor, these thugs made themselves masters of the public highways and treated roughly anybody attempting to use the roads. Major Hunter see- ing a large quantity of ammunition and guns stored inquired of McDowell about the need for the same. “This is being kept for ducks,” said McDowell. Then the State and County officials appealed to the Coal Company to withdraw the gunmen, for they felt that in a mining community which was 100% organized their presence and con- duct would very likely create serious difficulties. To these ap- _ peals Superintendent McDowell replied: “I’ve broken other strikes and | will break this one.” On Wednesday, June 21, the miners sent a group to attempt to win over the strikebreakers. McDowell and the armed guards stopped them with a volley that killed Henderson and wounded Pitscavith who soon died. Of this, Major Hunter testifying before E. J. May, arbitrator of the State Industrial Commission, said: “Mr. McDowell telephoned me the afternoon of June 21, the day before the riots and said they killed two or three union men. Personal investigation has developed that the men were shot down by McDowell.” This inflamed the striking miners. Two of their comrades, peaceful and unarmed, had been killed by the gunmen. They had been terrorized. They had been insulted and intimidated. 118 THE GOVERNMENT—ST RIKEBREAKER They had been deprived of the right to work for any but a star- vation wage. The miners revolted. They were bent on settling matters. And they did. Early next morning miners from all sections of the county flocked into the vicinity of Herrin. Congressman Denison thus described the scene: “Early Thursday morning they marched to the strip mine aud made an assault upon it. After a few rounds of gunfire the strikebreakers surrendered. They were marched to Herrin and Marion and deported. “There is a great deal of confusion and unsupported statements as to what happened during the miners’ RAV CUse vet. ie But after the battle was over there were nineteen strike- breakers dead—a gory monument to the coal Operators’ mad lust for profits. The Coroner’s Jury investigated the case and found that the Coal Company was guilty. On it rested the whole responsibility for the explosion. Then came lurid paintings of horror in the employers’ press thruout the country. “Revenge” was the battle cry of the ca- pitalists. The number of killings were grossly exaggerated and rivers and woods were brought in to give the affair a wild touch. However, the real facts were well pointed out by a surviving strikebreaker: “The people to shoot are the mine owners who lied to get us down here and make us do scab work. I tried to leave the mine when I found what I have been brought from Chicago for, but the guards wouldn’t let me go. The guards in the pit with us shot to death two union miners Wednesday before the union men surrounded us.’’3) 2) Ibid, page 3. 3) Ibid, page 3. ery tae 3 ee ti HERRIN—A LESSON IN AMERICAN CLASS WAR_ 119 But to the press and the Chambers of Commerce and the President the truth did not matter. The workers were guilty of a capital crime. In the eyes of the employers denying strikebreakers a “right to work” that is denying them a right to rob the workingmen of food for themselves and their families— is a crime punishable by imprisonment. But denying strike- breakers a right to live and shoot down peaceful and unarmed union men is a crime whose horrors defy description. The Chorus of Revenge On the day after the battle the employers of the country began a savage campaign of reckless vituperation. They clamored for merciless retribution. The very next morning the notorious Associated Employers of Indianapolis, one of the leaders in the open-shop drive of the capitalists, issued a statement urging the “red blooded citizenship to wire and write Governor Small urging him to afford the fullest possible protec- tion to life and property in the legitimate mining of coal, notwithstanding the miners’ union. We strongly suggest also that you bring the entire situation before each society, club, lodge, organization and church to which you belong, and urge that they shall either act for their membership or have the individual members send similar telegrams and letters. This is part of a national effort that is being made to condemn and forever stamp out disloyal propaganda and teachings that are primsar- ily responsible for such horrifying and un-American out- breaks as that just experienced by the Southern Illinois Coal Company, merely because it was not operating a union mine.) (Our Italics). Soon the labor-hating Illinois Chamber of Commerce took over the direction of this campaign. It organized a drive to raise $25,000 to pay for the prosecution of the miners of Herrin. A 4) The Nation, October 11, 1922, page 358. 120 THE GOVERNMENT—STRIKEBREAKER plan of energetic publicity was prepared and the propagandists went to work to “get” labor. In one of its bulletins this Chamber of Commerce made a special boast of preserving the good name of Illinois thru such practical slogans as: “1. The punishment of the murderers in the Herrin massacre. “2.