THE MENACE OF THE I.W.W.
Since the attempt on the part of Imperial Germany to foment a strike of the 'longshoremen on the Atlantic and Pacific seacoasts as a means of preventing shipments of supplies and munitions to the Allies, the Secret Service had been continually on the alert against other attempts to cause trouble in various branches of organized labor. In this work the unions of America had given more than a hearty co-operation. Committees of members were appointed to confer with the Secret Service to learn the best means of detecting efforts of German agents to interfere with any industry by agitation among the workers. American labor proved itself loyal to the core.
Germany had made numerous attempts to create havoc in the American manufacturing plants by using various methods to entice workingmen away from their daily tasks. In many instances, the old method of agitation against conditions was tried. Subtler attacks were employed elsewhere. Tempting offers of employment at their trade in distant cities, with transportation paid, were made on condition that a sufficient number of workmen would join the migrating colony. Cunningly worded stories of fictitious dangers which confronted workers in various occupations were inserted in printed matter which was designed to reach wives, mothers and sweethearts, but every effort failed, because of the intense loyalty of the unions.
"Report anything which may cause two or more workingmen to leave the place where they are employed now," was the request made by the Secret Service. Members of the special committees, by ever watchful vigilance, detected the efforts of Germany at their inception.
Complaints against conditions were usually proved groundless by the Secret Service. In cases where the workingmen were not receiving fair treatment, a word to the owner was usually sufficient to correct the trouble, for the manufacturers had combined with the workers in preventing Germany from being successful in its plotting. The ideal positions which existed at distant points were proved to be phantoms. The Hun-inspired stories of dangers existing through the handling of various substances were denied by authoritative sources which could leave no doubt in the mind of the families of the workers. This was the work which the Secret Service had been doing in conjunction with labor since the attempt to foment the longshoremen's strike had been baffled.
Harrison Grant, president of the Criminology Club, and Dixie Mason, the pretty little Secret Service operative, had often discussed reports of these activities of German agents. Von Bernstorff, and his aides, had followed the traditional course in each effort, using members of the Kaiser's spy army in America to do the actual work of enticement or intimidation. Then this department of activity against America by the Huns suddenly stopped. Agents of the Kaiser no longer sought membership in unions, control of labor papers was relinquished by Dr. Heinrich Albert, the paymaster of the spy army, and it seemed that Germany had admitted defeat through the loyalty of American workingmen.
But neither Grant nor Dixie were deceived. Through the wireless in the Criminology Club, and through phonographic attachments at other stations confidential messages between the Wilhelmstrasse and the Imperial German Embassy in Washington were picked out of the air and later the secrets of the coded messages were deciphered. Through these Grant and Dixie knew that Germany's demands for successful demoralization of American labor had become more and more insistent as efforts of the spy army met with failure after failure. Then the demands suddenly ceased without any apparent reason and the president of the Criminology Club and the young Secret Service operative, through their intimate knowledge of Hun methods, felt that Von Bernstorff had sent a written report to Berlin of some plot which promised success if time were given for its prosecution and fulfillment.
So no vigilance was relaxed. The labor committees were warned against falling into a false feeling of security because of the apparent inactivity of Imperial Germany. Many months of watchful waiting followed, and then came the first rumbling of a storm which threatened the whole existence of labor, a storm which actually accomplished the destruction of millions of dollars worth of wheat and other cereal supplies.