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to make still further modifications of the National banking laws. This was also under direction of Senator

Aldrich, and contained some provisions that were not only obnoxious to the minority party, but to a strong faction in the Republican ranks. The disaffection came mainly from the representatives of the Middle West, who conceived that the amendments to the laws were indicative of a still further yielding of the control over the National finances to the banking interests. It was originally proposed to allow banks to deposit railway bonds as a part of the security for their note circulation. This, however, was defeated, and the securities other than National bonds were restricted to interest-bearing obligations of the States and the legal bonds of counties, cities, towns, etc. The opposition to this bill in the Senate was led by Senator LaFollette, who inaugurated a filibuster which lasted nearly two days, but which in the end proved fruitless, as the bill was passed in spite of his efforts, May 30, 1908.*

*For the provisions of the Act, see previous chapter.

In the campaign of 1908 it was generally understood that the Republican party was pledged to a "downward revision,

revision," and that was advocated by its candidate for President. Immedi

ately after his inauguration in 1909, President Taft called a special session of Congress, and the Payne-Aldrich bill was passed, as has been told in previous pages. Out of this tariff grew the reciprocity treaty with Canada which was rejected by the people of that country in 1911 as has been told in a previous chapter.*

* Maurice L. Muhleman, The Money of the United States Its Volume from 1873 to 1893 (1894); John J. Knox, United States Notes (1884); History of the Currency from the Earliest Period to June 30, 1900 issued by the Treasury Department, Washington; Albert Sidney Bolles, Financial History of the United States from 186185 (1886); Davis Rich Dewey, Financial History of the United States (1903); Levi P. Morton, Free and Unlimited Coinage of Silver (1879); C. J. Bullock, Essays on the Monetary History of the United States (1900); Alonzo B. Hepburn, Government Currency vs. Bank Currency (1908); W. G. Sumner, A History of American Currency; J. Lawrence Laughlin, History of Bimetallism in the United States; A. D. Noyes, Thirty Years of American Finance; C. F. Dunbar, Laws of the United States Relating to Currency, Finance and Banking, and Chapters on the Theory and History of Banking; Horace White, Money and Banking.

strike in the United States

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Peonage and padroning after the Civil War - The rise of labor unions - Objects of the first labor organization - The Knights of Labor and its aims - The Federation of Labor and its growth The first great labor A decade of industrial unrest - The Homestead strike and its lessons Other serious labor conflicts - The boycott and its legal status - Blacklisting - Industrial combinations vs. competition-Compulsory arbitration in labor disputes - The evils of child and woman labor-Legislative restrictions of the former Attempts to regulate the latter - Other labor legislation.

With the disappearance of chattel slavery in 1865, every man in America was at least nominally free to follow any industrial pursuit and make any labor contract he saw fit. However, the Federal government found it necessary to adopt laws against peonage. One of the most notable cases under this law was that of Alonzo Bailey, in which the Supreme Court declared null and void a law of Alabama designed to foster this system. † Another form of unfree labor is that of convicts. The convict lease system has practically disappeared, the convicts now being employed by the State in productive industries or on public works. The protests of labor organizations, so commonly heard a few years ago, against their employment in productive industries, have ceased almost entirely.

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After the Civil War the padrone system, by which foreigners were brought over under contract, was resorted to for the purpose of securing cheap labor. In the West the importation of Chinese and Japanese became common. Some features of the padrone system still exist, but the coming of Chinese laborers has been prohibited since 1882. Since 1885 there has been a law (amended in 1907) to prohibit the importation of laborers under contract; but, owing to defects and inadequate penalties, it is not rigidly enforced.*

The increase of capitalistic production, which was hardly checked by the Civil War and has increased very rapidly since that event, the rapid changes from adversity to prosperity, and the sudden accumulation of large fortunes, accentuated the differences between the rich and the poor as never before. The multiplication of machinery seemed also to work against the individual, hence there

*See Adams and Sumner, Labor Problems, pp. 90-91.

was a corresponding growth of solidarity among laborers. Dissatisfaction with labor conditions must find its remedy, not in individual, but in collective action. This gave rise to the formation of unions, to strikes, and boycotts. A counter movement was found in various schemes of profit-sharing and coöperation. In

a few cases they have proved very successful, but they offer no valid grounds for any hope that they will solve the labor problem.

Labor unions hardly assumed a National character before 1850. Their real history may be said to begin with the organization of the International Industrial Assembly of North America at Louisville in September of 1864. The motive of this organization, as stated in the preamble to its constitution, was to maintain the rights and dignity of labor against capitalists who "have banded themselves together in secret organization, for the express purpose of crushing out our manhood" and have assumed "the right to own and control labor for the accomplishment of their own greedy and selfish ends, regardless of the laws of nature and Nature's God." This may be taken as having been the basic principle of unions ever since. Such organizations multiplied and grew very rapidly in different industries, and projects were soon on foot to unite the unions. The first important outcome of this was the

Commons and Andrews, vol. ix., p. 123.

Knights of Labor. This grew out of a local union organized at Philadelphia in 1869. It was gradually extended to other trades, a "national resistance fund " was accumulated for use by "brothers in need against the aggressions of employers," and the name Knights of Labor was adopted. Its policy was war on aggregations of wealth unjustly accumulated and the establishment of coöperative industries. It demanded the establishment of bureaus of labor, the holding of public lands for actual settlers, simplification of the administration of justice, abolition of the contract labor system, weekly payments, and an eight-hour working day.* For a time, under the presidency of Terrence V. Powderly, this was the leading organization of the country.

In 1881 the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions came into existence, which took issue with the Knights of Labor mainly on questions of the autonomy of such trade. The struggle continued until 1886, in which year the high-water mark was reached, in point of numbers, by the Knight of Labor and the nationalizing of trades. Then occurred the transition of the newer organization into the American Federation of Labor, which soon passed the older order and under the presidency of Samuel Gompers, took its place as the most powerful labor organization in

* Dewey, National Problems, pp. 41-43, 49-50.

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the country. It now publishes an official organ, The American Federationist, and includes 115 national and international organizations, with an approximate membership of 2,000,000.

The specific sources of dissatisfaction can best be gathered from the causes of strikes. In the years 1881 to 1905 there were 36,757 strikes involving 181,407 establishments and 8,703,824 workers.* Of these strikes 11,851, or 32.24 per cent., were for increase of wages; 4,067, or 11.06 per cent., against reduction of wages; 3,117, or 8.18 per cent., for increase and other causes; 1,797, or 4.89 per cent., for reduction of hours; 6,926 or 18.84 per cent., for recognition of the union; 2,693, or 7.33 per cent., concerning the employment of certain persons; 1,346, or 4.42 per cent., in sympathy with others on strike or locked out. It should be added that other questions were involved in the strikes for recognition of the union.t Labor organizations were responsible for 69 per cent. of the strikes. They were successful in 49 per cent. and partly successful in 16 per cent.

The first strike in our history which may be called National was the great railway strike of 1877. In July of 1877 the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad announced a fourth reduction in wages for all employees receiving over $1 per day, offering proof from its books that this was necessary.

Twenty-First Annual Report of the United States Commissioner of Labor, p. 621.

Dewey, National Problems, pp. 56–57.

The freight brakemen and firemen, who received from $1.50 to $1.75 per day, struck at once. Being unskilled and knowing that men could easily be found to take their places, the employés refused to allow the trains to run without the strikers. Then employés on other roads struck for higher wages, and in a little while the roads of 14 States were involved. The peaceably disposed attempted to avoid violence and not to interfere with the United States mail, but the great numbers of idle men and vagabonds produced by the lean years following the panic of 1873 were ready for rough work; hence there was a good deal of violence and destruction of property, especially at Pittsburg, and the aid of Federal soldiers had to be invoked. The strikers then opened negotiations with their employers and the strike was over, two weeks after it began. Each side claimed the victory.*

The decade 1880 to 1890 was one of greater unrest than any previous period in our history. In consequence there was a widespread discussion of Socialism, then popularly confounded with a certain kind of Anarchism. About the middle of the decade the struggle became sharp and violent. Again the trouble began with the railways, but soon extended to other industries. On May 3, 1886, a riotous demonstration was made at the Mc

* Sparks, National Development, pp. 70-76; Appleton's Annual Encyclopedia, 1877, pp. 423432.

Cormick Reaper Works, Chicago, in behalf of the eight-hour day. Next day, when the police attempted to disperse a crowd gathered at the Haymarket Place to listen to speeches denouncing them for interfering with this demonstration, a bomb was thrown and shots were fired, killing seven of the police and wounding many more. The country was horrorstricken and demanded vengeance. As a result, seven men were condemned to execution.*

Within the next few years several strikes occurred which were attended by violence and bloodshed. The most noteworthy was that at Homestead, a suburb of Pittsburg, in 1892, which was due to a reduction of wages and a refusal to recognize the union. The Carnegie Steel Company hired a number of Pinkerton detectives to protect their property, which so enraged the strikers and their friends that actual warfare raged for several days. The State militia was ordered out and martial law was declared. Under this protection, the company was able to substitute non-union men, and by November 20 the strike had ended in a complete failure. Ten years later unionism had practically disappeared from the steel industry.

This contest disclosed the fundamental issues at stake as no other had done, and brought into sharp contrast the old ideas of individualism

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and property rights as against the newer ideas of collective interests and of the Rights of Man. The management justified their conduct on the ground that it was their right to protect their property, to do what they would with their own, and showed that they were really upholding freedom of labor. The strikers, on the other hand, claimed that the workmen and the public, as well as the capitalist, had a proprietary interest in the mills and therefore rights to a voice in the management. But the managers most emphatically asserted their right to run their "own" business and declared that any worker who dared to join a union or even talk about it would be instantly discharged. Later, complaint of low wages became almost as great an offence.*

The money panic of 1893 hit the business interests of the country a severe blow. In 1899 the Pullman Car Company at Chicago discharged some of its employés and reduced the wages of others. Four thousand of their employés struck, and the American Railway Union, to which these men belonged, ordered its members not to handle Pullman cars on the roads for which they worked. But the railroads had long-term contracts with the Pullman Company and the manager promptly decided to resist this boycott. The employés of all the roads entering Chicago promptly began a sympathetic strike

* American Magazine, March, 1911, p. 659.

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