that the increased wages would be paid for any definite period, and no provision was made for a reduction in the price of powder, the abolition of the company stores, the discontinuance of company doctors, or the semimonthly payment of wages, all of which had been demanded as conditions. of settlement. As a consequence, the offer was rejected and the strike continued. About the 20th of October the operators withdrew the notices embodying their first proposition, and substituted for them notices in which it was proposed to grant a 10% increase in wages, to reduce the price of powder, to pay wages semi-monthly in cash, and to adjust some of the other grievances against which the men so bitterly complained. This latter proposition, while not all to which the mineworkers believed themselves entitled, nevertheless afforded some relief from the intolerable conditions. which had formerly prevailed, and when submitted to the executive committees of the miners' organization, it was accepted. Work was resumed on October 29th.

In deciding to instruct the miners to resume work the officers of the union were confident that the victory achieved would result in building up among the anthracite men a strong, compact organization, and they were imbued with the hope that a year later the operators would enter into contractual relations with the union. In this hope of recognition they were disappointed, but the organization grew in numerical strength, and within a short time after the strike practically every man and boy in the anthracite fields was enrolled as a member of the United Mine Workers of America.

1The reduction in the price of powder, it was understood, was to be taken out of the advance in wages.

CHAPTER XLII

THE STRIKE DECLARED

Labor Problem in Anthracite Region not Settled in 1900. Attempt to Disrupt the Union. Stockades, Coal Depôts, and Washeries. The Local Bosses, the Railroad Presidents, and the Financiers. Organized Labor's Struggle for Existence. The Invitation to a Joint Conference. The Refusal of the Railroad Presidents. The Shamokin Convention. Intermediation of the National Civic Federation. The Scranton Meeting. The Offer of Arbitration. The Railroad President and the "Eminent Prelates." The Hazleton Convention. The Strike Declared.

THE

'HE coal strike of 1900, while resulting in a victory for the men, did not solve the problem of the proper relation between labor and capital in the anthracite field. Instead of fairly meeting the men face to face and arranging by joint agreement the wages, hours of labor, and conditions of work to prevail in the region, the operators simply posted notices upon their breakers and towers, and the men accepted the concessions thus announced. There was no meeting between representatives of the two sides and no formal treaty was made. The concessions were wrung from the operators under the stress of a political campaign and were silently accepted by the mineworkers under advice of their union.

It was felt by both sides that the struggle was not conclusive. Just as the American colonies secured their independence in the Revolutionary War, but did not secure its confirmation until the War of 1812, so the anthracite mineworkers of Pennsylvania gained their liberty in 1900, but did not firmly establish it until 1902.

The great railroad corporations owning and operating mines in the anthracite region were in 1900 officered by men who had no sympathy with the principles and purposes of trade unionism. They had no eyes to see, nor sense to appreciate, the achievements of the union in raising the standard and improving the calibre of the men employed in and about the

mines, and they could not realize or discern the new spirit of independence and hopefulness infused into the mineworkers by their organization. To them the union was nothing but a fighting machine to be fought, and the demands of the union, nothing but an increase in wages and a reduction in dividends. The union seemed to prevent them from running their business as they saw fit, from exercising despotic sway over the lives of their tens of thousands of workers. The men in charge of these vast industries were trained in the school of unorganized labor. They understood the art of obtaining work for low wages, but they utterly failed to comprehend the new spirit which would resist oppression at no matter what cost in suffering and privation. The ideal of these men to whom the anthracite coal industry of the country was entrusted was the annihilation of the union, its destruction root and branch. In the past the operators had destroyed the miners' unions, and what had been done once could surely be done again.

to come.

The aggressive policy of the operators was evident from the first. Immediately after the strike of 1900, stockades were built about many of the mines, depôts were established for the storage of coal, washeries were opened in many places, and preparations were made for the battle which was bound The efforts of the union to better the conditions of the workmen were resisted at every point, and the bosses discouraged the mineworkers from joining the organization or remaining members of it. Agents of the companies circulated freely among the unionists, and records of the proceedings of the organization were immediately available to the presidents of the roads. The minor officials and petty bosses, men skilled in the exploitation of labor, constantly sent reports to their superiors of the alleged misdeeds of the unionists; and the antagonistic spirit of the men in control of this great industry was whetted by misleading accounts of the supposed doings of the United Mine Workers.

The desire on the part of the great railway presidents to involve the United Mine Workers of America in a contest which would mean its defeat and dissolution, was apparently shared by men of even greater domi

nance and power. There is growing up in these United States a small body of multi-millionaires, men exorbitantly rich and tremendously powerful, but apparently without those ideals of free and democratic government which should be the distinguishing characteristic of every American citizen. The coal strike of 1902 seems to have been merely the first battle in a destructive war to be waged by the greatest monopolists of the country against the democratic organization of trade unionism. The battle was more than a struggle between operators and miners. It was rather a gigantic contest between organized and concentrated wealth upon the one side, and organized labor, extending to every section and every industry in the country upon the other. The attempt to defeat and disrupt the United Mine Workers of America was apparently only a part of a much larger program -the defeat and destruction of all the trade unions in the country.

In contrast to this the attitude of the United Mine Workers was one of conciliation and peace. In 1900 the men accepted the concession, which was flung at them rather than granted to them. In 1901 the union again maintained peace by a continuance of the agreement of 1900. In an interview held in 1901, in which President Thomas of the Erie Railroad, Senator Hanna, the Presidents of the Anthracite Districts of the United Mine Workers, and I, took part, it was agreed that the conditions of 1900 should be maintained, and the representatives of the Mine Workers left the conference with the hope, if not the anticipation, that the union would be ultimately recognized. These hopes, however, were doomed to be unfulfilled.

In the following year, 1902, every attempt consistent with the preservation of dignity was made by the representatives of the union to secure a joint conference with the operators in order that a strike might be avoided. On February 14th, 1902, the officials of the Mine Workers' Union addressed a letter to the various railroad presidents asking for a joint conference between operators and miners to be held in Scranton on the 12th day of March. This request was unanimously refused by the operators, who claimed that "there cannot be two masters in the management of business" and stated their opposition to any agreement or arrangement with the

union. The replies of the operators further attacked the union and held it responsible for the local strikes which had occurred during the last two years and which had really been traceable to the failure of the operators to meet the representatives of the union and settle grievances amicably.

Upon the refusal of the operators to meet them in joint conference, the mineworkers, in convention at Shamokin, formulated a series of demands to be presented to the operators. The increase in the cost of living had rendered of no effect the advances conceded in 1900, and the Mine Workers demanded a twenty per cent. increase in pay for men paid by the piece, a corresponding increase in the shape of a reduction in hours for men working by the day, the weighing of the coal, and the incorporation of these reforms in an agreement with the union. On March 22, by direction of the Mine Workers' convention, a telegram was sent to the railroad presidents, asking them to meet the representatives of the mineworkers for the purpose of discussing grievances. An immediate strike seemed unavoidable, but as a result of the intermediation of the National Civic Federation, a conference was arranged between the representatives of the miners and of the operators. An interview was accordingly held on the 26th of March, and action was delayed by the miners for a month in the hope of reaching an agreement. During this month, the National Civic Federation made every possible cffort to bring about a satisfactory adjustment and urged upon the operators the necessity of making some concessions. Public opinion, as reflected in the various newspapers of the country, also advised this course. The operators, however, remained obstinate, and at the second meeting with the representatives of the mine workers again refused to make any concessions whatsoever or to grant the slightest part of the demands made upon them. The officials of the Union, while realizing the justice of their position, offered to compromise their original demands by accepting a 10% instead of a 20% increase, and a nine-hour instead of an eight-hour day. This policy was dictated not by fear of losing the strike, but in order to avert the terrible suffering which, it was clearly foreseen would inevitably result from the desperate conflict. The peaceful attitude