A History of Trade Unionism in the United States

by Selig Perlman

CHAPTER 10

THE WAR-TIME BALANCE SHEET

The outbreak of the War in Europe in August 1914 found American labor passing through a period of depression. The preceding winter had seen much unemployment and considerable distress and in the summer industrial conditions became scarcely improved. In the large cities demonstrations by the unemployed were daily occurrences. A long and bloody labor struggle in the coal fields of Colorado, which was slowly drawing to an unsuccessful end in spite of sacrifices of the heaviest kind, seemed only to set into bold relief the generally inauspicious outlook. Yet the labor movement could doubtless find solace in the political situation. Owing to the support it had given the Democratic party in the Presidential campaign of 1912, the Federation could claim return favors. The demand which it was now urging upon its friends in office was the long standing one for the exemption of labor unions from the operation of the anti-trust legislation and for the reduction to a minimum of interference by Federal Courts in labor disputes through injunction proceedings.

During 1914 the anti-trust bill introduced in the House by Clayton of Alabama was going through the regular stages preliminary to enactment and, although it finally failed to embody all the sweeping changes demanded by the Federation's lobbyists, it was pronounced at the time satisfactory to labor. The Clayton Act starts with the declaration that "The labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of commerce" and specifies that labor organizations shall not be construed as illegal combinations or conspiracies in restraint of trade under Federal anti-trust laws. It further proceeds to prescribe the procedure in connection with the issuance of injunctions in labor disputes as, for instance, limiting the time of effectiveness of temporary injunctions, making notice obligatory to persons about to be permanently enjoined, and somewhat limiting the power of the courts in contempt proceedings. The most vital section of the Act relating to labor disputes is Section 20, which says "that no such restraining order or injunction shall prohibit any person or persons, whether singly or in concert, from terminating any relation of employment, or from ceasing to perform any work or labor or from recommending, advising, or persuading others by peaceful means so to do; or from attending at any place where any such person or persons may lawfully be, for the purpose of peacefully persuading any person to work or to abstain from working, or from recommending, advising, or persuading others by peaceful and lawful means so to do; or from paying or giving to, or withholding from, any person employed in such dispute, any strike benefits or other moneys or things of value; or from peacefully assembling in a lawful manner, or for lawful purposes, or from doing any act or things which might lawfully be done in the absence of such dispute by any party thereto; nor shall any of the acts specified in this paragraph be considered or held to be violations of any law of the United States."

The government was also rendering aid to organized labor in another, though probably little intended, form, namely through the public hearings conducted by the United States Commission on Industrial Relations. This Commission had been authorized by Congress in 1912 to investigate labor unrest after a bomb explosion in the Los Angeles Times Building, which was set off at the order of some of the national officers of the structural iron workers' union, incidental to a strike. The hearings which were conducted by the able and versatile chairman, Frank P. Walsh, with a particular eye for publicity, centering as they did around the Colorado outrages, served to popularize the trade union cause from one end of the country to the other. The report of the Commission or rather the minority report, which was signed by the chairman and the three labor members, and was known as the "staff" report, named trade unionism as the paramount remedy—not compulsory arbitration which was advocated by the employer members, nor labor legislation and a permanent governmental industrial commission proposed by the economist on the commission. The immediate practical effects of the commission were nil, but its agitational value proved of great importance to labor. For the first time in the history of the United States the employing class seemed to be arrayed as a defendant before the bar of public opinion. Also, it was for the first time that a commission representing the government not only unhesitatingly pronounced the trade union movement harmless to the country's best interests but went to the length of raising it to the dignity of a fundamental and indispensable institution.

The Commission on Industrial Relations on the whole reflected the favorable attitude of the Administration which came to power in 1912. The American Federation of Labor was given full sway over the Department of Labor and a decisive influence in all other government departments on matters relating to labor. Without a political party of its own, by virtue only of its "bargaining power" over the old parties, the American Federation of Labor seemed to have attained a position not far behind that of British labor after more than a decade of independent political action. Furthermore, fortunately for itself, labor in America had come into a political patrimony at a time when the country was standing on the threshold of a new era, during which government was destined to become the arbiter of industry.

The War in Europe did not immediately improve industrial conditions in America. The first to feel its effects were the industries directly engaged in the making of munitions. The International Association of Machinists, the organization of the now all-important munition workers, actually had its membership somewhat decreased during 1915, but in the following year made a 50 percent increase. The greater part of the new membership came from the "munitions towns," such as Bridgeport, Connecticut, where, in response to the insatiable demand from the Allied nations, new enormous plants were erected during 1915 and shipment of munitions in mass began early the next year. Bridgeport and surrounding towns became a center of a successful eight-hour movement, in which the women workers newly brought into the industry took the initiative. The Federation as a whole lost three percent of its membership in 1915 and gained seven percent during 1916.

On its War policy the Federation took its cue completely from the national government. During the greater part of the period of American neutrality its attitude was that of a shocked lover of peace who is desirous to maintain the strictest neutrality if the belligerents will persist in refusing to lend an ear to reason. To prevent a repetition of a similar catastrophe, the Federation did the obvious thing, pronouncing for open and democratized diplomacy; and proposed to the several national trade union federations that an international labor congress meet at the close of the war to determine the conditions of peace. However, both the British and Germans declined. The convention in 1915 condemned the German-inspired propaganda for an embargo on shipments to all belligerents and the fomenting of strikes in munitions-making plants by German agents. The Federation refused to interpret neutrality to mean that the American wage earner was to be thrown back into the dumps of depression and unemployment, from which he was just delivered by the extensive war orders from the Allied governments.

By the second half of 1916 the war prosperity was in full swing. Cost of living was rising rapidly and movements for higher wages became general. The practical stoppage of immigration enabled common labor to get a larger share than usual of the prosperity. Many employers granted increases voluntarily. Simultaneously, a movement for the eight-hour day was spreading from strictly munitions-making trades into others and was meeting with remarkable success. But 1916 witnessed what was doubtless the most spectacular move for the eight-hour day in American history—the joint eight-hour demand by the four railway brotherhoods, the engineers, firemen, conductors, and trainmen. The effectiveness acquired by trade unionism needs no better proof than the remarkable success with which these four organizations, with the full support of the whole labor movement at their back and aided by a not unfriendly attitude on the part of the national Administration, brought to bay the greatest single industry of the country and overcame the opposition of the entire business class.

The four brotherhoods made a joint demand for an eight-hour day early in 1916.[84] The railway officials claimed that the demand for the reduction of the work-day from ten to eight hours with ten hours' pay and a time and a half rate for overtime was not made in good faith. Since, they said, the employes ought to have known that the railways could not be run on an eight-hour day, the demand was but a covert attempt to gain a substantial increase in their wages, which were already in advance of any of the other skilled workers. On the other hand, the brotherhoods stoutly maintained during their direct negotiations with the railway companies and in the public press that their demand was a bona fide demand and that they believed that the railway business did admit of a reorganization substantially on an eight-hour basis. The railway officials offered to submit to arbitration the demand of the men together with counter demands of their own. The brotherhoods, however, fearing prejudice and recalling to mind past disappointments, declined the proposal and threatened to tie up the whole transportation system of the country by a strike on Labor Day.