The so-called strike of the Wisconsin Student Workers’ Union has much of instruction for those who have been watching the trend of University development during the past few years and are inclined critically to examine the effect upon the student of modern educational methods.
The strike occurred in an institution that is recognized as the leader in progressive education; that has given extraordinary liberties to the student body; that is probably working more directly for the material interests of the people than is any other American university; and it occurred in a State that is convinced of the expediency of generously maintaining an institution of higher education, and is levying taxes therefore which during ten years have increased more than threefold.
Largely under the initiative of the University, but with faith, often fully justified, in the practical value of the instruction therein given, the State has adopted many of the principles enunciated in the class room, and has accepted as advisors, or taken over and appointed on its commissions, practically every professor and instructor whose counsel might be of direct service in its legislative and executive efforts, or of indirect service to the people at large. The professional staff of the University, and the legislative and executive staff of the State, have thus organized what might be called a beneficent interlocking directorate, which is expressed more or less truthfully in the local aphorism: “The State University is destined to produce a University State.”
During the past decade, influenced by and participating in the political and social changes that have made Wisconsin conspicuous, and encouraged by the large enrollment in the so-called social and political sciences—an enrollment of nearly two thousand students, containing a generous representation from the congested districts of American cities, from the oppressed people of Europe and from formative governments generally—the University has added to its staff of professors and instructors, until these departments are not surpassed in attractiveness by any institution in America or indeed in Europe.
There is, then, among the student body a liberal admixture of those whose social and political convictions, so far as they are definitely formed, are not in entire accord with prevailing conventions. Some of the more restless have organized a Socialists Club, and affiliations have been established with Socialist organizations at Milwaukee and elsewhere, and speakers of advanced anarchistic views, such as Emma Goldman, on coming to Madison, draw large and not entirely unsympathetic student audiences.
Within the University, and justified under the plea for a more perfect democracy, the presence of strong class distinction and party feeling often introduces an earnestness and bitterness into student gatherings which is much more intense than in our older institutions of the east. Moreover, the discussion of party differences is not confined to the campus. The contestants, even though students, are accustomed to air their views in the public press; and the state legislature—in which there is a liberal admixture of representatives of all political parties—is occasionally called upon to adjust real or imaginary student wrongs.
To the Wisconsin student there is no mystery about the making or unmaking of law; to him the capitol is a place of recreation, and the legislators, many of them alumni, are his companions. The freshman comes under the control of a student legislative body that defines his privileges and attempts to control his liberties. This elective body not only assumes jurisdiction over the student as an individual, but, like an interstate commerce commission, it regulates the activities of various student organizations, particularly those alleged to have aristocratic tendencies. It fixes penalties for the infraction of student laws, authorizes arrests, and sees that culprits are brought before the Student Court, where they are tried and sentenced. This student legislative body, through its representation on student publications, and in other ways, is an active agency in making and molding student opinion, and the faculty has already recognized its jurisdiction. The Regents have agreed not to alter or abridge the control of Student Self-Government, except through process of conference. The student body has thus assumed, in certain respects at least, the same attitude toward the administration of the University that the University is accused of having assumed toward the administration of the State; or, to paraphrase the aphorism already given, “The University Student is destined to produce a Student University.”
The student labor trouble, therefore, is not to be looked upon as the result of a justifiable grievance between a handful of waiters, and the Steward in control of the University Commons. The relations between the student workers and the Steward had been cordial, and the reduction in the number of student employees was an economic necessity, and ordinarily would have excited no particular opposition. But under the peculiar conditions existing at Madison, where there are students who do not believe in the present order of things, where it is thought, by not a few, that legislation by labor will bring better social conditions, where machinery for organized resistance is fabricated as a pastime, where the tactics of “collective bargaining” are thoroughly understood, and where there are impulsive students anxious to assume leadership, the temptation to translate static into kinetic energy became irresistible.
It seems that about one hundred and thirty students had been given positions in the University as waiters, kitchen helpers, etc., receiving in compensation a substantial meal for each hour or fraction thereof of service. There was no dispute concerning the amount of service or the value of the compensation. The students admitted that the work was light, the board excellent; and the positions were considered the most desirable of their kind in the city. The body waited upon some two hundred and fifty men students, and upon nearly three hundred women students. (Thirteen women student waiters and helpers, employed in one of the dormitories, did not join the Union, and took no active part in the agitation.)
The completion of a new central kitchen had led to economies, and a few weeks before the end of the semester—it was thought in ample time for the young men to find employment elsewhere—preliminary announcement was made that the staff of student employees would be reduced, and twenty students out of a total of one hundred and thirty were individually so informed. Since it was perfectly obvious that their services were in fact not needed, the waiters received the announcement in good spirit and without serious question.