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the Commission secured to them substantial advances in wages and material improvement in conditions. What was perhaps even more important, it recognized the United Mine Workers of America as one of the contracting parties, thus fixing the status of that organization. According to the award of the Commission, which is to remain in effect from April 1, 1903, to April 1, 1906, all contract miners were to receive an advance of 10% in their rates of pay for cutting coal, for yardage, and for other work, for which standard rates or allowances previously existed. The engineers engaged in hoisting water were to have a reduction of hours from 12 to 8, with no reduction in pay, or, in other words, an increase of 50% per hour, while the engineers who were already working eight-hour shifts were to have no further reduction in hours, but a 10% increase in wages. Hoisting engineers and other engineers and pumpmen, except those before mentioned, were awarded an increase of 5% in their wages and relieved from duty on Sunday, with full pay, or, in other words, an hourly increase of 22%. The firemen were also awarded an eight-hour day instead of a twelvehour day, this being an increase of 50% in the hourly rate of remuneration. The company men or men who were paid by the day-representing about one-half the employees in and about the mines-were awarded a nine-hour instead of a ten-hour day, and as these men are practically paid by the hour, this award amounted to an increase of II 1/9% in their wage rate. These awards bearing upon wages were to be further advanced with every increase in the price of coal. When White Ash coal of sizes above pea coal sold at or near New York harbor at a price above $4.50 f. o. b., the employees were to have for every 5¢ in excess of this price, an increase of 1% in their wages. This will probably amount to an average increase of 5% during the entire year, this being in addition to the increases before mentioned. The total addition to the wages of the anthracite mineworkers secured through the strike of 1902 will probably average between seven and eight millions of dollars annually.

The Commission awarded the payment of the miners' laborers directly by the Company instead of by the miner; provided that the mine cars should

be equitably distributed, that the men should be granted the right to have check weighmen and check docking bosses, whenever a majority at a colliery demanded it, and decreed that no person should be refused employment because he belonged or failed to belong to a labor organization.

The recommendations of the Commission, were, upon the whole, such as would commend themselves to well-intentioned and well-informed men. "The Commission thinks that the practice of employing deputies

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is one of doubtful wisdom, and perhaps tends to invite conflicts between such officers and idle men rather than to avert them." The Commission further stated that the employment of coal and iron policemen “militates against the very purpose for which they are employed." It recommended laws against the employment of young children and the compulsory investigation by the Federal Government of controversies of the nature of the Anthracite Coal Strike.

The most important feature of the award was the provision for a board of conciliation. While disclaiming the wish to compel the recognition of the United Mine Workers of America, the Commission in actual practice made that recognition inevitable and immediate. The Commission recognized the fact that it could not itself settle future disputes as they arose; it realized that it was not a perpetual body, and it feared, with good reason, that if no machinery were provided for the interpretation and enforcement of the award, such award would soon be nullified, and conditions would lapse into their former evil state. The Commission seemed to realize, moreover, that there existed no machinery except the organization of the United Mine Workers of America capable of guaranteeing the integrity of the award, and in forming a board of conciliation, therefore, it saw itself compelled to rely upon the machinery provided by the Union.

The Commission adjudged and awarded: "That any difficulty or disagreement arising under this award, either as to its interpretation or application, or in any way growing out of the relations of the employers and employed, which can not be settled or adjusted by consultation between the superintendent or manager of the nine or mines, and the miner or

miners directly interested, or is of a scope too large to be so settled or adjusted, shall be referred to a permanent joint committee, to be called a board of conciliation, to consist of six persons, appointed as hereinafter provided. That is to say, if there shall be a division of the whole region into three districts, in each of which there shall exist an organization representing a majority of the mine workers of such district, one of said board of conciliation shall be appointed by each of said organizations, and three other persons shall be appointed by the operators, the operators in each of said districts appointing one person.

"The board of conciliation thus constituted, shall take up and consider any question referred to it as aforesaid, hearing both parties to the controversy, and such evidence as may be laid before it by either party; and any award made by a majority of such board of conciliation shall be final and binding on all parties. If, however, the said board is unable to decide any question submitted, or point related thereto, that question or point shall be referred to an umpire, to be appointed, at the request of said board, by one of the circuit judges of the third judicial circuit of the United States, whose decision shall be final and binding in the premises.

"The membership of said board shall at all times be kept complete, either the operators' or miners' organizations having the right, at any time when a controversy is not pending, to change their representation thereon.

"At all hearings before said board the parties may be represented by such person or persons as they may respectively select.

"No suspension of work shall take place, by lockout or strike, pending the adjudication of any matter so taken up for adjustment.”

The significance of this award is evident and those who run may read. The organizations of the three districts meant, of course, the District Organizations, 1, 7 and 9, of the United Mine Workers of America. The presidents of these districts, Messrs. T. D. Nicholls, Wm. H. Dettrey, and John Fahy, were appointed as representatives of the Union upon the board of conciliation, and the operators appointed Wm. Connell, independent operator, Roland C. Luther, General Manager of the Philadelphia & Reading

Coal and Iron Co., and S. F. Warriner, Gencral Superintendent of the Lehigh Valley Coal Co. These appointments were made in June, 1903, but the operators at first refused to recognize the three district presidents, and for a time feeling ran high in the anthracite region. The men were determined upon striking, unless they were assured that their duly accredited representatives would be accepted by the board. A convention of all anthracite mineworkers was held and the appointment of the mineworkers' representatives confirmed. The railway presidents, recognizing the unwisdom of their policy, agreed to be bound by the action of the convention, and at the present time the board of conciliation, is succeeding in satisfactorily solving all questions of interpretation as they arise. The institution of a board of conciliation augurs well for the continued peace and prosperity of the anthracite region. The present award remains in force until the first day of April, 1906, and will, no doubt, be scrupulously adhered to, both by operators and miners. At that time, there is every reason to believe that the operators will appreciate the wisdom of remaining upon good terms with their employees, and will enter into yearly agreements with the United Mine Workers of America. If the men and the operators can work together for three years under the award, if they can learn to understand each other's motives and to realize that they have large interests in common, the future of a clear and definite recognition by means of trade agreements need not be despaired of, and wage disputes in the anthracite industry will then be adjusted as they are in the bituminous fields to-day-by joint conventions representing the capitalists and the laborers. The award, however, must be lived up to according not only to its letter, but to its spirit. If either the men or the operators try to see how far they can diverge from the intention of the award without actually breaking it, instead of trying to see how clearly and consistently they can live up to it, no award and no agreement will ever endure. I have no doubt, however, that with each month relations will continue to improve, and that from 1906 on, labor conditions will be fixed annually by joint convention, and peace and contentment reign in the region so lately distracted and ravaged by a great industrial conflict.

CHAPTER XLVI

LABOR FEDERATION IN THE UNITED STATES

Federation an American Idea. The Principle of Federation carried further in the United States than in England. Local Unions the Base of the Pyramid; the Federation the Apex. Federation Begins after the Civil War. The National Labor Union. Platform and Principles. Politics and Dissolution. Knights of Labor. "The Five Stars." Secrecy and Publicity. Methods of Organization. Rapid Growth. Principles. The Rise of the American Federation of Labor. Its Constitution and Government. National Organizers. Federal Unions. Contrast between the Knights and the Federation. Program of the Federation. National Conferences. Scope and Nature of Work. The Future of Labor Federations in the United States.

HE history of trade unionism in the United States has shown the development of national or international unions from local unions and the evolution of a trade union federation out of the varicus national organizations. The base of this huge pyramid is formed by tens of thousands of local unions, representing various trades and scattered throughout the cities, towns, and villages of the country. Exclusive of state branches, there are one hundred and twelve national and international unions, exercising jurisdiction over their locals, and, finally, there is a single federated body, to which the national, international, and other unions send delegates.

The federation of trade unions, as we understand and practice it, may be said to be an American idea, as the principle of associated effort among trade unions has been carried further in this country than in Great Britain or elsewhere. There is nothing in British trade unionism that may fairly be compared with the American Federation of Labor, although loose attempts at federation were made earlier in England than in the United States. As has been said, both local and national unions developed later in this country than in Great Britain. Attempts at federation were not made until even a more recent date. Until the year 1850 there was nothing in

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