William Z. Foster
The Great Steel Strike and Its Lessons

III
The Giant Labor Awakes

A BLEAK PROSPECT—HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL—A GOLDEN CHANCE —DISASTROUS DELAY—THE NEW PLAN—A LOST OPPORTUNITY—THE CAMPAIGN BEGINS—GARY FIGHTS BACK

From just previous to, until some time after the beginning of the world war the situation in the steel industry, from a trade-union point of view, was truly discouraging. It seemed impossible for the workers to accomplish anything by organized effort. The big steel companies, by driving the Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel and Tin Workers from the mills, had built up a terrific reputation as union crushers. This was greatly enhanced by their complete defeat of Labor in the memorable strikes of the structural iron workers, the lake sailors, the iron miners, and the steel workers at McKees Rocks in 1909, Bethlehem in 1910 and Youngstown in 1915-16. It was still further enhanced by their blocking every attempt of the individual trades to re-establish themselves, and by the failure of the A. F. of L. steel campaign, inaugurated by the convention of 1909, to achieve even the slightest tangible results. The endless round of defeat had reduced almost to zero the trade unions’ confidence in their ability to cope with the militant and rapacious steel manufacturers.

But as the war wore on and the United States joined the general slaughter, the situation changed rapidly in favor of the unions. The demand for soldiers and munitions had made labor scarce; the Federal administration was friendly; the right to organize was freely conceded by the government and even insisted upon; the steel industry was the master-clock of the whole war program and had to be kept in operation at all costs; the workers were taking new heart and making demands—already they had engaged in big strike movements in the mills in Pittsburgh (Jones and Laughlin Company), Bethlehem and Birmingham (U. S. Steel). The gods were indeed fighting on the side of Labor. It was an opportunity to organize the industry such as might never again occur. That the trade union movement did not embrace it sooner was a calamity.

The writer was one of those who perceived the unparalleled opportunity. But being at that time Secretary-Treasurer of the committee organizing the packing industry I was unable to do anything substantial in the steel situation until the handing down of Judge Alschuler’s decision giving the packing house workers the eight hour day and other vital concessions enabled me to slacken my efforts in that important movement. Immediately thereafter, on April 7, 1918, I presented a resolution to the Chicago Federation of Labor requesting the executive officers of the American Federation of Labor to call a general labor conference and to inaugurate thereat a national campaign to organize the steel workers. The resolution was endorsed by twelve local unions in the steel industry. It was adopted unanimously and forwarded to the A. F. of L. The latter took the matter up with the rapidly reviving Amalgamated Association, and the affair was slowly winding along to an eventual conference, with a loss of much precious time, when the resolution was resubmitted to the Chicago Federation of Labor, re-adopted and sent to the St. Paul convention of the A. F. of L., June 10-20, 1918. It follows:

RESOLUTION #29

Whereas, the organization of the vast armies of wage-earners employed in the steel industries is vitally necessary to the further spread of industrial democracy in America, and

Whereas, Organized Labor can accomplish this great task only by putting forth a tremendous effort; therefore, be it

Resolved, that the executive officers of the A. F. of L. stand instructed to call a conference during this convention of delegates of all international unions whose interests are involved in the steel industries, and of all the State Federations and City Central bodies in the steel districts, for the purpose of uniting all these organizations into one mighty drive to organize the steel plants of America.

The resolution was adopted by unanimous vote. Accordingly, a number of conferences were held during the convention, at which the proposed campaign was discussed and endorsed. The outcome was that provisions were made to have President Gompers call another conference, in Chicago thirty days later, of responsible union officials who would come prepared to act in the name of their international unions. This involved further waste of probably the most precious time for organizing work that Labor will ever have.

From past events in the steel industry it was evident that in the proposed campaign radical departures would have to be made from the ordinary organizing tactics. Without question the steel workers’ unions have always lacked efficiency in their organizing departments. This was a cardinal failing of the Amalgamated Association and it contributed as much, if not more than anything else to its downfall. If, when in its prime, this organization had shown sufficient organizing activity in the non-union mills, and especially by taking in the unskilled, it would have so intrenched itself that Carnegie and his henchman, Frick, never could have dislodged it. But, unfortunately, it undertook too much of its organization work at the conference table and not enough at the mill gates. Consequently, more than once it found itself in deadly quarrels with the employers over the unionization of certain mills, when a live organizer working among the non-union men involved would have solved the problem in a few weeks.

Nor had the other unions claiming jurisdiction over men employed in the steel industry developed an organizing policy equal to the occasion. Their system of nibbling away, one craft at a time in individual mills, was entirely out of place. Possibly effective in some industries, it was worse than useless in the steel mills. Its unvarying failure served only to strengthen the mill owners and to further discourage the mill workers and Organized Labor. It is pure folly to organize one trade in one mill, or all trades in one mill, or even all trades in all the mills in one locality, when, at any time it sees fit to do so, the Steel Trust can defeat the movement by merely shutting down its mills in the affected district and transferring its work elsewhere, as it has done time and again. It was plain, therefore, that the proposed campaign would have to affect all the steel mills simultaneously. It would have to be national in scope and encompass every worker in every mill, in every steel district in the United States.

The intention was to use the system so strikingly successful in the organization of the packing industry. The committee charged with organizing that industry, when it assembled, a year before, to begin the work, found three possible methods of procedure confronting it, each with its advocates present. It could go along on the old, discredited craft policy of each trade for itself and the devil take the hindmost; it might attempt to form an industrial union; or it could apply the principle of federating the trades, then making great headway on the railroads. The latter system was the one chosen as the best fitted to get results at this stage in the development of the unions and the packing industry. And the outcome proved the wisdom of the decision. In the steel campaign the unions were to be similarly linked together in an offensive and defensive alliance.

But all this relates merely to the shell of the plan behind Resolution No. 29. Its breath of life was in its strategy; in the way the organization work was to be prosecuted. The best plans are worthless unless properly executed. The idea was to make a hurricane drive simultaneously in all the steel centers that would catch the workers’ imagination and sweep them into the unions en masse despite all opposition, and thus to put Mr. Gary and his associates into such a predicament that they would have to grant the just demands of their men. It was intended that after the Chicago conference a dozen or more general organizers should be dispatched immediately to the most important steel centers, to bring to the steel workers the first word of the big drive being made in their behalf, and to organize local committees to handle the detail work of organization. In the meantime the co-operating international unions were to recruit numbers of organizers and to send them to join the forces already being developed everywhere by the general organizers. They should also assemble and pay in as quickly as possible their respective portions of the fund of at least $250,000 to be provided for the work. The essence of the plan was quick, energetic action.

At the end of three or four weeks, when the organizing forces were in good shape and the workers in the mills acquainted with what was afoot, the campaign would be opened with a rush. Great mass meetings, built up by extensive advertising, would be held everywhere at the same time throughout the steel industry. These were calculated to arouse hope and enthusiasm among the workers and to bring thousands of them into the unions, regardless of any steps the mill owners might take to prevent it. After two or three meetings in each place, the heavy stream of men pouring into the unions would be turned into a decisive flood by the election of committees to formulate the grievances of the men and present these to the employers. The war was on; the continued operation of the steel industry was imperative; a strike was therefore out of the question; the steel manufacturers would have been compelled to yield to their workers, either directly or through the instrumentality of the Government. The trade unions would have been re-established in the steel industry, and along with them fair dealing and the beginnings of industrial democracy.

The plan was not only a bold one, but also under the circumstances the logical and practical one. The course of events proved its feasibility. The contention that it involved taking unfair advantage of the steel manufacturers may be dismissed as inconsequential. These gentlemen in their dealings with those who stand in their way do not even know the meaning of the word fairness. Their workers they shoot and starve into submission; their competitors they industrially strangle without ceremony; the public and the Government they exploit without stint or limit. The year before the campaign began, 1917, when the country was straining every nerve to develop and conserve its resources, the United States Steel Corporation alone, not to mention the many independents, after paying federal taxes and leaving out of account the vast sums that disappeared in the obscure and mysterious company funds, unblushingly pocketed the fabulous profit of $253,608,200.

It now remained to be seen how far the unions would sustain such a general and energetic campaign. The fateful conference met in the New Morrison Hotel, Chicago, August 1-2, 1918. Samuel Gompers presided over its sessions. Representatives of fifteen international unions were present. These men showed their progressive spirit by meeting many difficult issues squarely with the proper solutions. They realized fully the need of co-operation along industrial lines, from the men who dig the coal and iron ore to those who switch the finished products onto the main lines of the railroads. Plainly no trade felt able to cope single-handed with the Steel Trust; and joint action was decided upon almost without discussion. Likewise the conference saw the folly of trying to organize the steel industry with each of the score of unions demanding a different initiation fee. Therefore, after much stretching of constitutions, the international unions, with the exception of the Bricklayers, Molders and Patternmakers (who charged respectively $7.25, $5.00 and $5.00), agreed to a uniform initiation fee of three dollars, one dollar of which was to be used for defraying expenses of the national organization work.

At the same meeting the National Committee for Organizing Iron and Steel Workers was formed. It was made to consist of one representative from each of the co-operating international unions. Its given function was to superintend the work of organization. Its chairman had to be a representative of the A. F. of L. Mr. Gompers volunteered to fill this position; the writer was elected Secretary-Treasurer. Including later additions, the constituent unions were as follows:

This group of unions, lined up to do battle with the Steel Trust, represents the largest body of workers ever engaged in a joint movement in any country. Their members number approximately 2,000,000, and comprise about one-half of the entire American Federation of Labor.

So far, so good. The conference had removed the barriers in the way of the campaign. But when it came to providing the large sums of money and the numerous crews of organizers that were immediately and imperatively needed to insure success, it failed dismally. The internationals assessed themselves only $100 apiece; they furnished only a corporal’s guard of organizers to go ahead with the work; and future reinforcements looked remote.

This was a facer. The original plan of a dashing offensive went to smash instanter, and with it, likewise, the opportunity to organize the steel industry. The slender resources in hand at once made necessary a complete change of strategy. To undertake a national movement was out of the question. The work had to be confined to the Chicago district. This was admittedly going according to wrong principles. The steel industry is national in scope and should be handled as such. To operate in one district alone would expose that district to attacks, waste invaluable time and give the employers a chance to adopt counter measures against the whole campaign. It meant playing squarely into Mr. Gary’s hands. But there was no other way out of the difficulty.

The writer had hoped that the favorable industrial situation and the organization of the packing industry, which had long been considered hopeless, would have heartened the trade-union movement sufficiently for it to attack the steel problem with the required vigor and confidence. But such was not the case. The tradition of defeat in the steel industry was too strong,—thirty years of failure were not so easily forgotten. Lack of faith in themselves prevented the unions from pouring their resources into the campaign in its early, critical days. The work in the Chicago district was undertaken, nevertheless, with a determination to win the hearty support of Labor by giving an actual demonstration of the organizability of the steel workers.

During the first week of September the drive for members was opened in the Chicago district. Monster meetings were held in South Chicago, Gary, Indiana Harbor and Joliet—all the points that the few organizers could cover. The inevitable happened; eager for a chance to right their wrongs, the steel workers stormed into the unions. In Gary 749 joined at the first meeting, Joliet enrolled 500, and other places did almost as well. It was a stampede—exactly what was counted upon by the movers of Resolution #29. And it could just as well have been on a national scale, had the international unions possessed sufficient self-confidence and given enough men and money to put the original plan into execution. In a few weeks the unions would have been everywhere firmly intrenched; and in a few more the entire steel industry would have been captured for trade unionism and justice.

But now the folly of a one-district movement made itself evident. Up to this time the steel barons, like many union leaders, apparently had viewed the campaign with a skeptical, “It can’t be done” air. But events in Gary and elsewhere quickly dissipated their optimism. The movement was clearly dangerous and required heroic treatment. The employers, therefore, applying Mr. Gary’s famous “Give them an extra cup of rice” policy, ordered the basic eight hour day to go into effect on the first of October. This meant that the steel workers were to get thereafter time and one half after eight hours, instead of straight time. It amounted to an increase of two hours pay per day but the actual working hours were not changed. It was a counter stroke which the national movement had been designed to forestall.

Although this concession really spelled a great moral victory for the unions its practical effect was bad. Just a few months before the United States Steel Corporation had publicly announced that, come what might, there would be no basic eight hour day in the steel industry. Its sudden adoption, almost over night, therefore, was a testimonial to the power of the unions. But this the steel workers as a whole could not realize. In the Chicago district, where the campaign was on, they understood and gave the unions credit for the winning; but in other districts, where nothing had been done, naturally they believed it a gift from the companies. Had the work been going on everywhere when Mr. Gary attempted this move, the workers would have understood his motives and joined the unions en masse,—the unions would have won hands down. But with operations confined to one district he was able to steal the credit from the unions, partially satisfy his men, and strip the campaign of one of its principal issues. No doubt he thought he had dealt it a mortal blow.

 

Next: IV. Flank Attacks

The Great Steel Strike and Its Lessons Table of Contents
William Z. Foster | Communist Party, USA | Marxists Internet Archive