CHAPTER XXXIX

THE STRIKE VERSUS THE TRADE AGREEMENT.

The Trade Agreement and Industrial Peace. The Agreement and Union Recognition. Difficulty of Reaching Agreements. The True Coöperation between Labor and Capital. The Essence of Trade Unionism. The Agreement in its Simplest Form. Local and National Agreements. How Agreements are Reached. The TreatyMaking Power of the Union. Sentiment and Business. The Agreement and the Future Relations of Labor and Capital.

THE

'HE hope of future peace in the industrial world lies in the trade agreement. There is nothing so promising to the establishment of friendly relations between labor and capital as the growing tendency of representatives of both sides to meet in friendly conference in order to settle conditions of employment. These conferences are as impressive as important. The men assembled in national joint convention represent two great estates, the employers and the workmen of a vast industry. It is like a congress legislating for a nation, or, rather, like a coming together of the representatives of two great nations, upon the basis of mutual respect and mutual toleration, for the formulation of a treaty of peace for the government of industry and the prosperity and welfare of the contracting parties.

The trade agreement is the clearest and most unmistakable recognition. of the importance of labor to capital and of capital to labor. The coöperation between these two factors of production, a coöperation more spoken of than believed in, receives in these formal treaties of peace and amity definite expression and complete confirmation. The bituminous coal operators, representing an approximate yearly output of 200,000,000 tons, and the bituminous mineworkers, numbering about 250,000, recognize in their annual conferences their dependence upon each other for the furtherance of their respective needs and for the promotion of their joint interests. The

trade agreement represents the highest form of cooperation in modern industry.

The formulation of a trade agreement which will be satisfactory to both sides and will meet with the approval of all parties, is by no means easy. Those who deny to workingmen capacity for self-government should study the making of agreements as worked out in Great Britain and the United States. These agreements and the conferences which precede them require a high degree of intelligence and wise moderation upon the part of the workmen and diplomacy and skill on the part of the leaders. Before such an agreement is possible, a basis of reasonable demands must be evolved. One section of workmen may have to make concessions in favor of another, and frequently the whole body must postpone the presentation of justifiable demands until a more opportune moment. It is necessary, moreover, for both the leaders and the rank and file to appreciate the attitude and position of the employers. An agreement, to be made and lived up to, must be reasonable and fair to both sides; and it is unwise, even if it were possible, to insist upon terms that are ruinous or seriously detrimental to employers. The formulation of such an agreement, moreover, requires great patience and forbearance and necessitates an unusual degree of technical knowledge. The problems taken up and discussed are complex and difficult. The workmen or their representatives must be informed concerning wages in their own as well as in other industries; the cost of living; the cost of production to the employers; the charges for transportation; the state of the market; the price, cost, and quality of competing products; the character of machinery and processes used, as well as many other factors entering into the question of the ability of employers to pay higher wages. The workingmen must recognize the difference between what is desirable and what is attainable, and must exercise an unusual degree of self-restraint.

The trade agreement secures to the workingman what various beneficent and cooperative schemes in the past have failed to secure-a real cooperation between employer and employee and a measure of control by

workingmen over the conditions of industry. Coöperative schemes, suggested by the philanthropy or justice of employers, are, in a sense, an acknowledgment of the claim that workingmen should have a say in the conduct of business. These schemes, however, are not as a rule successful, and where the employer has, as he should have, the complete control of buying, selling, advertising, accepting credits, making contracts, etc., the effect of extra exertion by the workingman often has but an inappreciable influence upon his share of the profits of the enterprise. The sliding scale is a more important form of coöperation and is of advantage where a high, definite, minimum wage is made the basis. These coöperative plans, however, prove as a rule but a slight stimulus to the workman and rarely give him any real interest in, or any real control over, the business. The employees of the United States Steel Corporation could not, at the present rate of subscription, secure control of the stock within a century, even if the stock were not increased during that time. The plan of securing even a partial control of industry by workingmen through the purchase or allotment of stock is as chimerical as a scheme suggested to me by a friendly correspondent, during the recent strike, viz., that I use the strike fund to purchase the various railroad and mining properties under the control of the antagonistic corporations, and thus bring the strike to a close.

The gift of money, the payment of premiums, and the grant of small favors and privileges do not constitute in any true sense a cooperation between employer and employee. While individual employers have made splendid benefactions, the influence of these gifts is small, except in a few instances. The creation of model towns, the establishment of libraries, gymnasiums, natatoriums, and assembly rooms for workmen are entirely commendable and highly praiseworthy, if they do not involve such a dependence of the workingman upon his employers as will render it impossible for him to voice his grievances or present reasonable demands. It is well that the workman be provided with free napkins, towels, ice water, and other conveniences and comforts; but the maintenance of factories as clean and as pleasant as possible should not be a matter of the individual bounty

of employers. After all, the American workingman does not want to be favored or coddled. The total amount of benefactions of this sort is probably much less than one-tenth or one-twentieth part of one per cent. of the annual wages of the American workingmen. Whatever their amount, however, these benefactions, whether they be good or evil in their purpose and in their result, do not create or constitute that real coöperation which can be obtained only through the trade agreement.

The trade agreement represents the very essence of trade unionism. In its simplest form the agreement is nothing but a determination of wages, hours of labor, and conditions of work by men in a single establishment or a single local community. From the very beginning of labor organization, agreements of this nature have been made by men working in the same establishment or the same town, and these agreements, whether verbal or written, have been binding upon all the men so engaged. These agreements have sometimes been nothing more than the simple formulation of shop rules, the determination of the length of the working-day, and similar matters, which have thus been taken out of the realm of individual bargaining between the employer and each separate employee, and have been incorporated into a contract binding upon all.

Trade agreements, therefore, even in their simplest form, represent the central idea for which trade unionism stands, viz., the collective or joint bargain, and they presuppose the existence of a union and, in the case of agreements upon a large scale, associations of employers as well as of workmen. The difficulty in the way of forming trade agreements in the past has been this lack of organization upon the part of employers, and it has been largely due to the stimulus of trade unionism that employers have organized upon a national basis and have entered into yearly contracts with their workmen. These agreements were made in England at an earlier date than in the United States, because of the earlier development of national organizations in that country. They have, however, become increasingly popular in the United States, and in about a dozen important trades they now regulate the conditions of industry.

The machinery of the trade agreement has been evolved in each trade in answer to the necessities of that trade, and the systems in vogue differ, therefore, in various particulars. In the main, however, the same principles are observed. As far as possible, the machinery has been simplified and has been rendered effective and easy to control. There is, as a rule, a joint convention consisting of employers on the one side and representatives of the union upon the other, and no provision is made for the presence of paid attorneys or of experts. The number of representatives differs in the various conventions. It is usually provided that the vote must be unanimous, and there is, therefore, no possibility of the formation of a contract without its being clearly satisfactory to all interests represented.

ment.

Joint agreements are, in fact, treaties of peace determining the conditions under which the industry will be carried on for a year, although longer agreements have been made and maintained. The agreement usually provides for the settlement or arbitration of all controversies which may arise under it. It is provided, however, that the arbitration shall be in the nature, not of negotiation, not of a change in the conditions fixed by the agreement, but shall be limited entirely to the interpretation of the agreeIn the contracts existing in the bituminous coal mining industry, it is provided that in the case of a dispute arising between any operator and miner over a point covered by the inter-state agreement that cannot be settled between the parties directly at interest, appeals may be taken from one tribunal to another until the court of last resort is reached. During the course of the dispute, however, the men remain at work, and as a result of the trade agreement and of the provisions therein contained for the adjustment of all questions in controversy, the number of petty local strikes has been minimized and conflicts of this nature have almost entirely disappeared.1

'The following is quoted from the agreement between the coal miners and operators of Illinois:

"(13 b) In case of any local trouble arising at any shaft through such failure to agree between the pit-boss and any miner or mine laborer, the pit committee and the miners' local president and the pit boss are empowered to adjust it; and, in the case of