The lockout.—Lockout is a name given to a method employed by managers to prevent the continuance of a strike by aid of the sympathy of employés not directly interested. It often happens that a comparatively small body of workmen in a great factory strike for higher wages, and are sustained in their strike by the sympathy and support of other workmen in the same factory. Under these conditions the employer is tempted to stop all work by a sudden closing of all shops, that the pressure of suffering among a large body of wage-earners may force the smaller body to accept the old conditions. The lockout seldom gains a popular sympathy, for the reason that employers appear to be using this method of warfare from a superior position of power. And yet no one can dispute the general right of employers to control of their business. Such a sudden stopping of business without an attack by a strike or some similar provocation would be considered inhuman, and popular sympathy would be wholly with the laborers and consumers interested.
General evils of such conflicts.—The incidental effects of such violent opposition between profit-makers [pg 264] and wage-earners are certainly detrimental to all interests. The great multitude of farmers throughout the country depend for welfare upon the body of people using farm products, and all the waste of power from enforced idleness of wage-earners, managers and machinery is shared by farmers through diminished power of the rest of the world as consumers. In only a few instances have strikes affected agriculture directly, partly because the relations of employer and employed are so largely personal; partly because the supply of agricultural laborers for the season is usually large; but chiefly because wage-earners upon farms in this country expect eventually to become themselves proprietors, and so no separate organization is probable. In some countries, however, where wage-earners in farming communities are a class by themselves, a strike has been the only method by which the barrier of custom and law, built up through many generations, could be broken. The great agricultural strike in England will always be remembered as having elevated the standard of labor and living in that country. It is to the interest of all farmers to cultivate a better understanding between employers and employed than can be maintained with any general expectation of strikes, boycotts, lockouts or similar warlike methods of settling fair wages.
Trades' unions.—The organizations known as trades' unions, in which the wage-earners in any particular kind of business unite for self-protection, have had a gradually widening influence upon the relation of managers to employés. Once they were characterized as “machinery by which 10 per cent of the working classes [pg 265] combine to rob 90 per cent,” because the advantage secured usually comes out of the consumers of products. But today reasonable doubts of the general advantage of a well-managed trades' union have disappeared. If once they seemed a conspiracy against society in general, they are now recognized as a part of the general progress in mutual recognition of rights and privileges. It seems right to expect from them still larger usefulness, with a clearer perception of their importance. It is evident that they contribute somewhat to general intelligence of their members, and so far as this is true they help toward greater efficiency. At the same time they help to maintain stability of employment and stability of other conditions surrounding labor.
A brief enumeration of ends they may serve directly will help to appreciate their importance. First, they can as truly estimate the market value of wages by gathering statistics from all parts of the country and from other countries as can any organization in commerce estimate the market value of produce. Second, they can serve as an employment bureau in furnishing information of places where work is wanted, thus equalizing the advantages as well as the burdens of their associates. Third, they can make more uniform and more satisfactory the customs in regard to the length of a day's work or privileges of any kind associated with the work as perquisites. Fourth, they can, if they will, find the true gradation of skill and of wages among workmen, so as to establish a natural line of advancement. Fifth, they rightly do, and can still further, serve for mutual support in cases of illness, and for protection [pg 266] of a community against fraud in pleas of poverty. Sixth, they may easily and properly, if they will, provide for insurance of character, both as men and as workmen, by issuing certificates, and under proper provision giving bonds, such as are required in many positions of trust. Seventh, they may extend their operations even to the taking of jobs that require a variety of work continuing through a period of time. Eighth, they can, under most favorable circumstances, undertake various stock enterprises, especially coöperative stores, thus securing an incentive to saving, and diminishing the spirit of antagonism against the profit-makers. Finally, though they have the best possible organization for a successful strike, if necessary, they can subordinate this disposition toward warfare to a broader machinery for fair consideration of all interests and for individual arbitration of rights.
Such organizations, under good management, win the respect of all, and find a recognition of their methods satisfactory. Farmers' clubs and granges, though far from reaching ideal efficiency, furnish suggestions of the general utility. Unfortunately, these organizations, having little if any basis of capital, have seldom been incorporated under the laws of the state. Could the powers and purposes of such organizations be established upon a basis of statute law, the range of their usefulness might be greatly increased. They might even sustain a method for enforcing in the courts the collection of wages, where the single wage-earner often accepts the half loaf in a compromise rather than meet the expense and loss of time involved in a law suit. [pg 267] Certainly the establishment of legal relations between the trades' union and the state would give to it a character and stability most likely to promote all interests.
Federations of labor.—The so-called federations of labor, in which practically the only bond of union between individuals is the fact that all are wage-earners, have so far worked out but a small part of the problem involved in their existence. They have the advantage of uniting large numbers and a variety of interests; but they have the disadvantage of subordinating all other interests to the supposed conflict between employers and employed. Their tendency is almost certain toward lowering standards of efficiency, and attempting by class legislation to get the advantage of mere numbers.
It is almost impossible that the organization shall be kept out of the field of bargains in politics and contrivance for special legislation, demoralizing to the whole country. Too often the votes of members are made a bribe for securing certain favors. In the nature of the case, they sustain a body of officers whose chief business is in danger of becoming that of either political agitators or political bosses. The machinery of organization is liable to reduce the independence of individuals. The organization itself is liable to demand a personal subordination almost equivalent to military rule, and the badge of the society may mark a man as under direction of authority. Even in questions where the majority rule, the force of the federation requires the caucus principle of absolute adherence, even though the majority represents the weakest and least intelligent [pg 268] part of the organization. The demoralizing effect of such methods, including wholesale trading of opinions, is liable to debase citizenship, and so to diminish the individual self-respect, which is the highest possible protection for laborers.
Courts of arbitration.—Arbitration between employers and employed, in cases of serious misunderstanding, has long been advocated as a wise means of settling differences. The obstacles to its general, voluntary adoption are considerable. Employers object because it involves the admission of an outsider as a judge of their business methods. The employés object because they fear the sympathy of arbitrators with the superior intelligence, wealth and power of employers. Yet there seems no good reason why a representative body of men, chosen for character and ability, should not be appealed to by both parties in a contest which has already broken up the natural relations of business. As has been shown, the whole community suffers in every interruption of production and trade, and so far the community has the right, and should have the legal privilege, of insisting upon the fairest and quickest means of settling the controversy. In far less important difficulties between individuals, society insists that either individual shall have the right to bring the other into court.
Society is waiting only to settle the best form of a court of arbitration for labor difficulties. The trend of popular judgment is in favor of a well-organized commission, having the dignity if not the authority of a supreme court. That such commissions have not generally [pg 269] come up to the ideal is due largely to political influence among leaders of organizations, so that the commissioners become the choice of a faction rather than of the people. It is conceivable that the functions of judges in a series of state courts may be so enlarged under carefully framed laws as to include the duty of arbitration in labor contests.
If the people are not yet ready for compulsory settlement of such questions, the time is surely coming, under the enormous aggregation of industries and the immense combination of employés, when the judgment of the people expressed in due form of law will control both employer and employé. The whole world is recognizing methods of arbitration as better than warfare. It will soon insist that these minor wars within the commonwealth shall cease.