The Railroaders' Next Step—Amalgamation/Chapter 1

by William Z. Foster

 

Labor Herald Library
No. 1.

The Railroaders' Next Step—
Amalgamation

CHAPTER I
THE THIEVING RAILROADS

The supreme need of railroad men at the present time is a consolidation of our many labor organizations into one compact body. The power of the companies has become so enormous, their solidarity so intense, and their greed so voracious, that the prevailing type of federated craft unionism is no longer able to cope with the situation. If we are to maintain existing labor conditions, not to speak of making further advances, we must arrive at a more solidified form of organization. The tremendous latent power of the great army of railroad workers will have to be fully developed. This can be done successfully only by the amalgamation of the sixteen principal railroad craft unions into one industrial union covering every branch of the railroad service.

As I write this (March, 1922) events are taking shape that render more pressing than ever the need for the utmost possible power and solidarity on the part of all railroad workers. The companies are now making a big drive, politically as well as industrially, to crush the unions and to force us down to serfdom. They have secured the passage of the Esch-Cummins law limiting the right of railroad men to strike. And not content with that they are forcing through the Poindexter bill, abolishing this right altogether and providing fines, of from $500 to $10,000 and imprisonment not to exceed ten years for those who even "solicit, advise, induce or persuade, or attempt to induce or persuade" railroad workers to quit their jobs. Besides this they have induced the pliable Railroad Labor Board to abolish the national agreements, and in many cases the eight hour day itself; wages have been slashed to the bone and more reductions are in sight. Piece work is being established on many roads, likewise company unions. In fact the railroads are carrying on a great drive—which is all too successful—to reestablish pre-war conditions of slavery for their workers. The only way this campaign can be resisted effectively is for the workers on the railroads to develop the strongest, most closely-knit organization possible. And this cannot be achieved until the entire body of them are fused together into one all-inclusive organization.

This anti-union campaign is, of course, calculated to reduce railroad workers to utter helplessness so that we may be ruthlessly exploited by the railroad owners. The latter are in business solely for profit. In their greed to make money they consider all means legitimate. They are the biggest single gang of thieves in the world. Humanity and fair play cut no figure with them. So long as their own profits are forthcoming they care not a rap for the sufferings of their workers. That is why they have so bitterly fought every working improvement in the railroad industry; collective bargaining, better wages, shorter hours, the sixteen-hour law, the safety appliance laws, etc. Because it paid them well, they were entirely content to have their workers exhausted by from 25 to 60-hour runs, abused like dogs by tyrannical foremen, pauperized by low wages, destroyed by piecework systems, crushed to death by faulty equipment, etc., etc. The only protection the workers have had from the most savage exploitation, the sole thing that has kept us from sinking into complete degradation is our trade unions. These organizations have achieved results entirely upon the basis of the amount of power they have been able to exert. The railroad owners can appreciate no other argument than that of might. With them might is right.

Plundering the Public Domain

In order to develop a militant union policy the very first requisite for railroad workers is a clear understanding of what powerful and unscrupulous crooks are our opponents, the companies. Hence, in the following pages will be cited some of the shady exploits of the transportation magnates:^[1]

From its very inception railroading in this country has been a process of brazen thievery. Every means that human ingenuity could devise has been used without stint or limit to prostitute the nation's transportation system to the benefit of a few social parasites. Merciless exploitation of the workers, land-grabbing, stock-watering, rebating, bribing of legislators and judges, embezzlement, perjury—these are some of the criminal methods habitually resorted to in building up the present ownership of the giant railroads. The man who could figure out some new scheme to rob the people was hailed as a great inventor by the railroad crooks; and his fortune was made. The cleverest thief has always been the most successful railroad magnate.

A rich source of plunder for the railroad owners was the Government land. They literally stole an empire of it. Their usual method was to have corrupt lobbyists push bills through the National and State legislatures giving them vast grants of land for building the railroads. Thus the Northern Pacific got 47,000,000 acres, the Southern Pacific 18,000,000, the Union Pacigc 22,000,000, and others accordingly, until 160,000,000 acres in all oi the people's heritage had been stolen. This enormous stretch of land is equal in extent to the states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Indiana. It fell into the maw of the railroad thieves.

Most of this is rich farming, mineral and timber land. It is now worth billions of dollars. One unacquainted with the greed of the railroad companies might think that they would have been satisfied with this gigantic steal. But not they; they are money mad; they want the whole country. It happened that some of their land grants included desert land; so, in the guise of helping poor settlers, they had a law passed allowing anyone who had received government desert land to exchange it for government farming land. Then they hastily dumped in 50,000,000 acres of desert land and took in exchange, not farming land, but 50,000,000 acres of Northwest timber land, the finest on the globe. This was a typical railroad fraud.

Besides the land grants, the Government (inspired to action by big campaigns of open bribery) gave the early railroad builders large money subsidies. These were a fruitful source of loot. For example, the men behind the corrupt Central Pacific got in land and other subsidies $86,000,000 wherewith to build their road. The total cost of building, including the greatest extravagance and graft, was $42,000,000. The remaining $44,000,000 of the Government gift they calmly pocketed. Thus the Government paid for the road twice over and still it belonged to Huntington and his fellow-crooks. These gentlemen, whose descendants are highly honored citizens, started out in 1861 with a capital of $108,987. Twenty-three years later they had succeeded in stealing 5,906 miles of railroad capitalized at $454,000,000, not to mention other properties. Up till the present time this project has yielded its owners $700,000,000 that is to say, the grafters have been paid enough to build their roads seven times over and still they own them completely.

Robbing One Another

It would be wrong, however, to leave the impression that the railroad magnates have confined their efforts to exploiting Labor and defrauding the Government. That would be to misrepresent their nefarious business ethics. Their policy is to grab everything in sight that is not nailed down, no matter whom it may belong to. They are impartial in the matter. They rob each other as freely as they do outsiders. A time-honored device to do this is for the controlling clique in a company to milk the rest of the stockholders (and thus the people at large) by setting up an outside company, owned by themselves, to do construction and repair work for the parent railroad and then voting it contracts at fabulous prices. Thus the grafters have sucked in millions and millions of dollars in ill-gotten gains, and thus many a railroad has been bled white, thrown into a receiver's hands and left for the people to re-finance. We see the same policy in operation at the present time, with the railroads letting out immense quantities of work to "independent" equipment companies while their own shops and workers stand idle.

Bitter, dog-eat-dog wars have raged between rival interests for many years over the control of the railroads. In these brutal encounters the law of fang and claw prevail. Everything from petty larceny to murder is considered legitimate. The struggle for the Erie was typical: Originally this road was built by public subscription, but as usual a bunch of thieves got title to it. They sucked it dry with the customary methods, and finally lost it to one Daniel Drew by a mortgage foreclosure. Drew used the road for speculative purposes, making millions. But the greedy Vanderbilt, whom Gustavus Myers calls "the foremost blackmailer of his time, the plunderer of the National Treasury in the Civil War, the arch-briber and corruptionist," outwitted him, ruined him and seized the road. He made the mistake, however, of putting Drew, Jay Gould and Jim Fisk in charge of it. These worthies promptly double-crossed him and, by an illegal issue of stock, got control. Vanderbilt's crooked judge thereupon issued an order against them. But they fled his jurisdiction with $7,000,000 in cash, the proceeds of their robbery. Later on Gould and Fisk bribed the New York Legislature for $500,000 to make their stock issue legal. This left them masters of the situation. Then, freed from the threat of jail, they turned on their partner, Drew, and bankrupted him. Some time afterward Fisk was shot, and finally Gould was ousted by an English syndicate that, copying Gould's methods, spent $750,000 in bribery to do the job. Eventually the road fell into the grip of the great railroad octopus, Morgan & Co., and there it still remains. For these jungle fights, which raged everywhere, of course the workers had to pay the bill.

When the workers demand a few cents more per hour in wages the railroad companies always raise a howl about the dire things that will happen to the widow and orphan stockholders. But in their own brutal struggles for financial mastery they show no mercy to these elements. The robbery of the widow Colton was a case in point: Colonel Colton, her husband, was one of the four men who engineered the notorious Central Pacific land-grabbing, stock-jobbing steals for many years. It might have been thought that when he died his three partners in guilt would have shown his widow some consideration. But the principles of humanity never trouble railroad magnates. True to their kind, and like a pack of wolves rending one of their number that has fallen, the three remaining partners stole almost the last cent Mrs. Colton had. To do this they had to bribe her confidential adviser, her lawyer and a judge. But such matters are only details in the day's work of railroad owners.

A Sea of Watered Stock

A favorite thieving device is the watering of railroad company stocks. Every worker should know how this chicanery is operated. Let us explain it briefly: Suppose, for instance, a certain railroad is capitalized at $100,000,000. To water its stock the controlling capitalists, on the pretext of improving the property, issue, say, another $100,000,000 of stock. Thus the burden of the industry is doubled. Thereafter it has to pay dividends upon $200,000,000 instead of $100,000,000. The advantages .to the crooks engineering the hocus-pocus are many. For one thing they are enabled to steal scores of millions at a blow; and another is that the resultant cutting of the dividend rate (which in the case cited would be 50 per cent) puts the road in the position of being poverty-stricken and furnishes an excellent excuse for beating down wages and screwing up passenger and freight rates. When, however, through wage-cutting, rate-raising and the natural increase in business, the dividend rate rises on the watered stock, then the crooks inject more water and the whole process is gone over again.

By means of this watered stock swindle every railroad system in the United States has been used as an instrument of extortion and robbery. Dozens of railroads have had their equipment ruined and themselves thrown into bankruptcy because of it. At a hearing a few years ago in conection with the financial wrecking of the Rock Island it was found that the Moore & Reid interests had poured $350,000,000 of watered stock into the original capitalization of $75,000,000. It was more than the road could stand and it went under. In 1907, according to C. E. Russell, of the $409,946,845 capitalization of the New York Central, at the very least $175,000,000 was nothing but water. By watered stock and other crooked schemes the infamous Credit Mobilier gang similiarly ruined the Union Pacific. Then, when everyone thought it had been bled to death, Russell Sage and Jay Gould came along and stole another $100,000,000 from it. Later, Standard Oil, operating through Harriman, got the road and is now exploiting it more vigorously than ever. Up to 1908 the Great Northern clique, grace to their various land-grabbings and stockwaterings, had taken in profits from that rich property and had values in sight to the enormous amount of $1,526,016,521. Investigating the New York, New Haven & Hartford, which had collapsed financially, the Interstate Commerce Commission found that the bandits owning that concern had increased its capital stock 1500 per cent in eight years, and had pocketed almost all of the money.

The general result of this stock-watering continued over many years, has been to enormously over-capitalize the railroad industry. Many experts declare that all the railroads in the United States could be replaced for ten billion dollars. But the companies have them capitalized at nineteen billions, and insist upon returns on that basis. And the powers-that-be are quick to recognize their claims. The Interstate Commerce Commission is always very obliging in the matter of rates. And the Government does what it can, too. The infamous Esch-Cummins law, which Senator LaFollette fittingly characterized as marking "the unconditional surrender of Congress to Wall Street," guaranteed the railroads a return of at least 5½ per cent on their swollen capitalization during its term. Under its provisions the railroads were paid on the basis of $940,000,000 per year, or at the rate of enough to rebuild all of them in ten years. Such a price are we compelled to pay for being dominated and abused by our railroad autocracy.

To share in the great loot from the railroads there were officially listed on December 31st, 1918, 647,689 stockholders. But many of this number are duplications, because although one individual may hold stock in numerous companies he is counted separately for each holding. It is extremely doubtful if the total number of railroad stockholders will run over 100,000. And the great majority of these are small fry, owning only a share or two apiece. It has been estimated that one per cent of all the stockholdrs own over 50 per cent of all the stock. It is to support in luxury this minority of parasites that the vast army of 1,850,000 railroad workers keep the 235,000 miles of railroads in operation for beggarly wages and under the most unfavorable working conditions.

The Big Fish Eat the Little Ones

The foregoing examples of orthodox railroad methods will suffice to indicate the moral caliber of the unprincipled lot who have managed to steal their way into ownership of our transportation systems. Now, let us glance for a few moments at the way in which they are concentrating and consolidating their forces, in order to exploit Labor the better.

The pioneer railroad capitalists were men of comparatively small means. In the early days hundreds of small companies sprang up, each operating a little stretch of railroad, furnishing transportation to a limited district. But soon a strong current towards combination set in. Gradually the stronger financial groups absorbed the weaker ones (mostly by chicanery and fraud) and linked their many little "jerk-water" roads together, eventually building up the gigantic railroad systems of today.

The history of the New York Central is typical: Originally between New York and Buffalo, the present main line of the New York Central, there were sixteen separate railroads, each owned and operated by a distinct company. But the notorious Vanderbilt he who gave expression to the two working principles of capitalistic railroading; namely, "All the traffic will bear," and "The public be damned" grabbed control of all these petty roads and jammed them into one. Then he reached out and seized, one after the other, a whole series of big railroad systems, including the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern, Michigan Central, Big Four, Pittsburgh & Lake Erie, Boston & Albany, Erie, etc., each of which in turn had been built up of many small roads. Besides this, the growing octopus secured strong hold of such roads as the Delaware & Hudson; Delaware, Lackawanna & Western; Philadelphia & Reading; New York, Ontario & Western; Lehigh Valley, etc., and large numbers of trolley lines, coal mines, industrial plants, express and telegraph companies, etc., etc. It is an industrial Colossus.

Another case in point is that of the great New York, New Haven & Hartford system, controlled by the Morgan interests: Like the New York Central, this company built itself up from a lot of smaller ones, until, at last, it had secured a stranglehold on the entire railroad transportation system of New England. Then it proceeded to secure an almost complete monopoly of water traffic in its territory by absorbing the Fall River Line, Stonington Line, New Bedford Line, New Haven Line, Maine Steamship Company, Bridgeport Line, Hartford Line, Rock Island Line, and many so-called independent steamship companies. And, finally, it sought to do the same thing with the trolley lines. By means of flagrant legislative corruption it secured control of the entire electric transportation systems of Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Thus, in transportation of all sorts, the New York, New Haven & Hartford was dictator for the several states in which it operated.

The titanic Pennsylvania Lines were similarly brought about by the assimilation of small roads and affiliated industries. It is now accredited with 21,389 miles of trackage, the ownership of 72 subsidiary railroad companies and heavy interests in 254 related industries. Normally it employs about 275,000 workers.

The tendency towards consolidation shown in the three big systems cited above manifests itself in all sections of the railroad industry. Already the whole business has resolved itself into a few financial groups. In 1916 the World Almanac (page 216) listed these groups as follows:

Name	Mileage	Stocks	Bonds
Vanderbilt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	26,126	$ 628,924,000	$  765,441,600
Pennsylvania   . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	21,389	779,916,000	576,600,000
Harriman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	22,716	756,600,000	1,098,775,400
Hill . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	14,183	417,527,000	432,812,000

Name	Milage	Stocks	Bonds
Morgan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	14,117	573,619,000	545,118,000
Gould . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	22,318	541,220,000	822,613,000
Moore-Reid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	29,173	372,906,000	490,209,000
Rockefellers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	18,119	259,116,000	319,204,000
Walters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	11,914	150,116,000	204,119,000
Erb Syndicate. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	13,104	345,100,000	524,146,000
Independent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	34,069	653,108,000	486,113,000
Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .	227,228	$5,478,152,000	$6,265,151,000

Since this table was compiled many changes have taken place in railroad ownership. The monopolization of the industry has proceeded apace. A close study now demonstrates (The New Majority Chicago, March 5th, 1921) that financial control of the systems as a whole has simmered down practically to four great, closely-related, interlocked capitalistic interests; viz., Morgan & Co., The National City Bank (Rockefeller group), The First National Bank of New York (Baker group) and Kuhn, Loeb & Co. It is said that Morgan & Co. alone control 300 railroad directorships, besides owning 54 "independent" railroad equipment and construction plants and innumerable other enterprises.

The time is close at hand—if it has not already arrived unbeknown to us—when our entire transportation system will be ruled by a single financial interest. And at its head, backed by the nineteen billions of railroad capital and untold billions from other industries, will stand some super-Gary, the industrial emperor of America.

Workers Versus Exploiters

This tremendous consolidation and combination of the enemy's forces is of vital importance to railroad Labor. In years gone by there was real competition on the railroads. Between the many independent companies rate wars raged. Often in these struggles passenger and freight schedules were slashed to the bone. In one memorable case a transcontinental railroad reduced its passenger fare from Chicago to California to $1.00. Whereupon its rival retaliated not only by cutting its rate to $1.00 likewise, but also by furnishing free meals to its patrons en route.

Naturally, such unorganized, competitive conditions played into the hands of Organized Labor and made its fight easier. If the unions tied up a road the other roads usually left it to its fate. They seldom gave it any practical assistance, instead they grabbed what they could of its business. The consequence was that the companies were reluctant to enter into strikes, and comparatively more eager to settle them when they did occur.

But now things are altogether different. This is the era of railroad monopoly. Competition has been almost entirely eliminated. On the employers' side the railroad industry is practically united into one country-wide organism. National ownership has been concentrated into the hands of a few magnates, keenly conscious of their mutual interests; the national rate-making power is wielded by the tractable (to the companies) Interstate Commerce Commission rate wars are now merely a matter of history; the national administration of labor matters is looked after by the Association of Railway Executives; and the national technical problems are handled by the American Railroad Association.^[2] Everywhere is system, organization, standardization. And now it is proposed in powerful railroad circles to secure legislation fusing all the railroads into one gigantic system of ownership and operation. This is the logical outcome of the ceaseless tendency towards combination.

Now the effect of all this consolidation and interlocking of company interests is to make railroad Labor's fight much more severe. Today when the unions enter into battle with one company they have them all to fight. No more do other roads abandon one that has a fight on its hands, or try to take advantage of its crippled condition. Far from it! Now they rush to its support, furnishing it with financial backing, re-routing its traffic over their lines, lending it locomotives and cars, etc. Thus, through co-operation with one another, the resisting power of all the companies is enormously increased. Moreover, they have the united support of the courts, the newspapers, the banks, and the industrial interests generally.

This is a situation which the railroad unions, on pain of extinction, must meet effectively. And they can do so only by the complete elimination of the competitive principle from their own ranks. Faced by a united opposition, we railroad men cannot afford to have sectionalism, such as now exists, in our forces. We must not allow one part of our organization to be played off against the rest. We must present an unbroken front to the enemy. The railroad union situation must be brought to a uniform, national proposition. To do this it is necessary to amalgamate the sixteen railroad craft unions into one industrial union.

Now let us see to what extent in their long years of experience with unionism, the railroad workers have understood the need for closer affiliation, what has been done about it, and how the next step should be taken.

1. A11 railroad workers should read Gustavus Myers' "History of the Great American Fortunes," and C. E. Russell's "Stories of the Great Railroads." Both are full of well-authenticated accounts of the amazing robberies committed upon the American people by the railroad companies. Many of the incidents cited in this chapter are taken from their pages. The books are procurable from Chas. H. Kerr & Co. Chicago.
2. The American Railroad Association is a recent amalgamation of the American Railway Master Mechanics' Association; Association of Railway Telegraph Superintendents; Association of Transportation and Car Accounting Offices; Freight Claim Association; Railway Storehouse Keepers' Association, etc. It is divided into five departments: Operating, Engineering, Mechanical, Traffic, Transportation. If the need arose it would prove an efficient strikebreaking agency.