The Railroaders' Next Step—Amalgamation/Chapter 3
CHAPTER III.
THE EVOLUTION OF RAILROAD TRADE UNIONISM
Now, having seen the utter failure of the dual union program of the concious minorities, let us examine the drift of the conservative masses towards industrial unionism, for as yet it can hardly be called a concious movement.
Like the radical minority elements, the great body of railroad men have responded to the oppression of the railroad companies. But their manner of doing so has been vastly different. It is not their method to throw away their old unions, built through so much stress and struggle, and to begin all over again on a supposedly perfect basis as the dual unionists have so long urged them to do. No, they are far too sluggish for that. Their way is the evolutionary way, the way followed almost universally by workers in improving their organizations, and the one taken by the railroad companies in building up their own power. They have no plan or theory, but move pretty much as circumstances imperatively dictate. As they sense the need for more united action they build up and extend their old unions and then strike up closer and closer affiliations with sister organizations. The general result is a constant and steady, even if unrecognized, approach to the industrial form.
This unceasing evolution has gone on for many years, in fact from the very inception of railroad unionism. The stages making it up are many and complicated. Beginning with a whole series of primitive and isolated local unions, the organization has constantly marched on expanding and developing until it has reached its present condition of sixteen more or less loosely federated national craft unions covering the whole railroad industry. These unions are: Engineers (B. of L. E.), Firemen (B. of L. F. & E.), Conductors (O. R. C.) Trainmen (B. of R. T.), Switchmen (S. U. of N. A.), Telegraphers (O. R. T.), Clerks (B. of R. & S. C. F. H. E. & S. E.), Signalmen (B. of R. S. of A.), Stationary Firemen (I. B. of S. F. & O.), Maintenance of Way (U. B. M. W. & R. S. L.), Machinists (I. A. of M.), Blacksmiths (I. B. of B. & H.), Boilermakers (L B. I. S. B. & H. of A.), Carmen (B. R. C of A.), Electrical Workers (L B. E. W.), and Sheet Metal Workers (A. S. M. W. L A.). In order that we may understand the coming together process that has developed these craft unions and the alliances between them, and so* we will have a guide for future progress, it will pay us to review some of the details of the evolution. We will consider the sixteen principal unions in their three natural divisions of transportation, miscellaneous, and shop, beginning with the transportation section.
Development of the Transportation Unions
Originally the five unions actually engaged in the direct moving of passengers and freight, the Engineers, Firemen, Conductors, Trainmen, and Switchmen, like all the other railroad trade unions, followed a policy of individual action. That is, each craft group fought its own battles, regardless of the interests of the others. When one struck the rest stayed at work, with the natural result that much bitterness prevailed among them. This was intensified by raging jurisdictional wars and mutual scabbery. The general result was to seriously weaken them all and to make them pay dearly, through many lost strikes, for their lack of solidarity.
The evolution of the transportation unions, like all others, is to be measured chiefly by the extension and solidification of their fighting front against the employers. The first fighting unit used by the transportation unions consisted simply of the few workers in a single trade employed in only one town of a railroad system. For example, the conductors working out of a certain division town would negotiate an agreement with the company. Thus there might be a dozen agreements in effect for this one craft on the whole railroad. Naturally such a primitive method developed but little strength for the workers. Fighting as they did in such small detachments it was easy for the expanding companies to defeat them. So eventually they came to learn that they would have to operate on a broader scale. Then came the enlargement of the fighting unit until it included all the workers in a given craft upon a whole railroad system. Thereafter, the conductors, instead of acting together only in each division point, moved in concert all over the many divisions comprising the road. This type of one craft on one system became general quite early in the history of railroad unionism.
But it was only a step. The companies, waxing rapidly rich and powerful, found that with all the departments of a system in operation, save one, it was not difficult to defeat a striking craft. Hence the need for a still more extended battlefront pressed heavily upon the workers, and in 1889 an effort was made to finally solve the problem by federating the several transportation unions together on a national scale in the United Order of Railway Employes. But this federation was premature, and it fell to pieces in 1891 because of internal strife. Out of its ruins, however, grew one of the most important types of organization yet produced in this country. This is what is called the system federation.
System federations are alliances of several crafts on individual railroad systems. They operated to extend the fighting unit from one craft on one system to several crafts on one system. In the transportation department they brought about active offensive and defensive co-operation between the four brotherhoods[1] on all matters relating to single railroads. This type of organization was proposed by the Engineers in 1890. It was adapted in 1892, under what is known as the Cedar Rapids Plan, but it did not get wide application until within the last fifteen years.
The system federations have done much to break down the intense sectionalism of the brotherhoods. Tending to make the crafts better acquainted with each other, they have checked jurisdictional quarrels and produced a better co-operation all around. Naturally their component unions greatly increased in power from the extended scope of solidarity. This was clearly manifested in the big strikes on the southern Pacific (1913), the Delaware & Hudson (1914), and the Chicago Belt (1915). All three were cleancut victories. In each case the four organizations struck almost to a man and compelled the companies to grant their demands.
While the system federations were spreading throughout the country, the transportation unions, responding to the ever-present urge to get together, still further extended their scope of action by means of territorial or divisional organizations and movements. In order to make it clear what these important developments signify it is necessary to explain that the Government, the railroad companies and the workers consider the railroads of the United States as falling into three "territories" or divisions: Western, Eastern and Southern. The Western Territory, or Division No. 1[2] comprises all the railroads West of and including the Illinois Central; the Eastern Territory, or Division No. 2, all those East of Chicago and North of the Chesapeake & Ohio; the Southern Territory, or Division No. 3, all those East of the Illinois Central and South of the Chesapeake & Ohio, including the latter system.
The divisional type of organization enlarged the fighting unit of the crafts from the one system basis to that of the scores of roads that are to be found in each division, a significant advance. Henceforth, instead of the roads being handled separately on the questions of hours, wages, etc., they were dealt with in large numbers. But the divisional movements varied in character. Some consisted of only one craft, as, for example, those of the Engineers (Div. No. 1, 1908) and the Firemen (Div. No. 1, 1907) ; but eventually they came to consist of two crafts, thus doubling their scope. The Conductors and Trainmen inaugurated the latter type, when an alliance was struck up between them in 1901. The Engineers and Firemen followed suit by a similar alliance in 1913. Several of these two-craft divisional movements were made. A typical instance was that of the Engineers and Firemen in 1915 on all the roads in the West, comprising Division No. 1. Approximately 65,000 men were involved.
The system and divisional federations were vast improvements over the primitive types of organization and they did much to develop the latent power of the brotherhood men, but evolution could not stop with them. In the face of the growing intelligence of the workers and the intensified power of the companies they had to give away to a still broader type. This was a concerted movement of the four organizations on all the railroads in the whole country. This big advance manifested itself in the great struggle for the eight-hour day in 1916-17. Over 350.000 engineers, firemen, conductors and trainmen were involved. It constituted the largest, well organized wage movement known in America up to that time, and resulted in a victory for the men. To stem the threatened gigantic strike, Congress hastily passed the Adamson eight-hour law, and the mossback Supreme Court, under the lash, hopped around, and for about the first time in its history gave Labor a square deal by calling the law constitutional, just on the eve of the strike.
Thus, so far as we have gone, we find that the brotherhood men, responding to the pressure against them, have gradually extended their fighting unit from the narrow confines of one trade in one railroad town to broad-sweeping movements of the four trades on all the railroads in the United States. To one familiar with the gradual manner in which workers improve the structure of their labor unions this tremendous advance will stand out as a long stride towards the inevitable industrial union in the railroad industry.
Development of the Miscellaneous Unions
Before going further with the four brotherhoods let us turn our attention to the unions in the miscellaneous section; viz, Telegraphers, Clerks, Signalmen, Stationary Firemen, and Maintenance of Way Workers. Their evolution is comparitively simple. Before the war the latter four led a very precarious existence, as they possessed little organization upon the various roads. When the war came, however, they underwent a mushroom growth and swarmed nearly all of the eligible workers into their ranks. At one blow almost they advanced from the primitive status of negotiating separate agreements for each system to the establishments of national agreements for their respective crafts on all interstate systems.
Because of their long quarrel with the Trainmen, the Switchmen remained in the detached condition characteristic of the unions in the miscellaneous section. In fact, although properly a transportation union, they usually found themselves left out of the joint movements in that department.
Development of the Shop Unions
The principal shop unions are the Machinists, Blacksmiths, Boilermakers, Carmen, Electrical Workers, and Sheet Metal Workers. Their evolution was much more lengthy and involved than that of the miscellaneous unions. It is comparable to that of the transportation unions and merits our attention. It illustrates clearly the constant get-together tendencies of the railroad unions.
Like the members of the brotherhoods, the shop workers began early to perceive that their trades could not successfully fight alone. It was not enough that their respective crafts be highly organized. It was necessary also that they should co-operate together as against the common enemy, the companies. Dozens of lost strikes emphasized this lesson. So the shopmen entered upon a long course of drawing up their unions into federations, much as the brotherhood men have done, but without quite so many complications and refinements.
The first definite form of active co-operation among the shop trades was the familiar system federation. This type of organization did for the shop men what it did for the transportation men, expanded their scope of action from one craft on one system to several crafts on one system. They began to spread over the railroads of the country about 1905, and in a few years were established on many systems. But the shop men, less strategically situated in the industry than are the brotherhood men, have always had to fight harder to win concessions from the companies. Consequently their system federation movement met heavy resistance from the companies in a number of strikes, chief among which was the great Harriman Lines-Illinois Cential walkout.
This big strike started in September, 1911, and lasted forty-five months, until June, 1915. It was one of the most bitterly contested strikes in American labor history, and one of the most important. About 38,000 men were involved, scattered over the twelve railroads comprising the 'enormous Harriman Lines-Illinois Central system. The issue at stake was the question of federation; the nine unions insisting upon dealing collectively with the management, and the management insisting that they act one at a time. Both sides desperately fought out their issue. President Markham of the Illinois Central explained the company's opposition as follows:
"It would only be a question of years until the operating men became members of the system federation. That would place the company at the mercy of a compact body of labor to enforce its demands by tying up the system at all points. It would mean taking the control out of the hands of the board of directors and placing it in the hands of organized labor. That's why I am opposed to the system federation plan of organization."
Nominally the strike was lost, the workers being compelled to go back to work without either their unions or a settlement. But practically a large measure of victory was achieved, because the company paid so dearly for its victory that other companies hesitated to go into similar struggles; with the result that the shopmen's federations thereafter were quite generally recognized wherever the crafts had any strength of organization. The big strike definitely established the system federation movement. It also resulted in making the Railway Employes' Department the best department in the A. F. of L., by bringing about the amalgamation of the original half-dead department with the Federation of Federations, an organization called into being to unite all the system federations.
As in the case of the transportation unions, the divisional type of organization developed among the shop unions side by side with the system federations. The first divisional movement of shop men took place in Division No. 3 in 1916. Twelve Southern railroads were involved. In Division No. 1 an effort was made along similar lines shortly after; but the unions, not yet recovered from the big strike on the Harriman Lines-Illinois Central system, were unable to win their point. The companies blocked them, and compelled them to continue along with the old method of one craft or one system federation at a time, as the case might be.
At this stage of the shop unions' development the war broke out and the whole situation was revolutionized. The railroads were taken over by the Government; DirectorGeneral McAdoo issued his famous order No. 8 guaranteeing railroaders the right to organize; the workers streamed into the unions; local, system and divisional federations were hastily organized, and the shop unions fairly leaped even beyond the point of development reached by the brotherhoods in their great eight-hour movement of a couple of years before. They not only carried out national campaigns for hours, wages, etc., but in addition succeeded in negotiating a national agreement covering the whole six shop crafts upon all the railroads of the United States thereby taking another long stride towards firmly uniting the great body of railroad men in one organization.
Transportation, Miscellaneous and Shop Unions Unite
To recapitulate: So far as we have gone we find the sixteen railroad unions operating as follows: First, the four transportation unions, consisting of the Engineers, Firemen, Conductors and Trainmen, acting in close cooperation upon a national scale. Second, the six miscellaneous unions, consisting of the Telegraphers, Clerks, Switchmen, Signalmen, Stationary Firemen and Maintenance of Way Workers, each proceeding separately, but all working upon a national basis. Third, the six shop unions, consisting of the Machinists, Blacksmiths, Boilermakers, Carmen, Electrical Workers and Sheet Metal Workers, all working under a single national agreement.
This situation was a far cry from the primitive type of unionism described above. But evolution could not stop there. The same forces that had brought the organizations to this stage of development must continue to operate until there is complete solidarity among all railroad workers. It was inevitable that the two compact groups of transportation and shop unions and the scattering group of miscellaneous unions should strike up a co-operation among themselves upon a national scale.[3]
The first step in this direction had to do with political measures. The unions clearly recognized their industrial relationship and mutual interdependence in the Plumb Plan. To advocate this proposal they formed themselves into the Plumb Plan League, issued the joint journal, "Labor," and launched a general publicity campaign. But it was not long until this new co-operation also manifested itself on the industrial field, and in 1920 all the organizations united in a national movement for wage increases.
Thus, after many long years of evolution, the enormous army of railroad workers, beginning at the simple system of one trade acting at a time in each division town, finally arrived at the stage where all the trades acted together simultaneously on every railroad in the United States. Although the lineup was yet far from perfect, the 1,850,000 railroad men, for the first time in their history, were moving in a body against the common enemy. The approach made to industrial unionism by this long evolution is unmistakable.
Much of this national, all-trades co-operation is unquestionably flimsy as yet, as we shall see farther on. It may be that the present alliances will be partly dissolved through the shortsightedness of the men though the sixteen trades strike on the Atlanta, Birmingham & Atlantic augurs well. But such setbacks can only be temporarily. The evolution of the unions will go on, in spite of occasional reverses, until all the railroad workers of America stand stolidly united in one organization, fully conscious of their common interests against the common foe, and determined to fight shoulder to shoulder to make them prevail.
For industrial unionists the facts cited in these two chapters should bear an important lesson. They make it clear as day that the dual unions have failed utterly, and that the trade unions provide the means for the realization of industrial unionism on the railroads. Not only have the latter organized the vast bulk of all railroad workers; but they are also constantly closing up their ranks in a manner that can only end in transforming them all into one organization. The part of wisdom then is to give up dual unionism and to devote all our efforts to the development of the trade unions.
The worst of the dual industrial unions is not so much that they have failed of themselves, but rather that they have greatly retarded the progress of the trade unions. In the first place, they have discredited the very name of industrial unionism by associating it with secession, disruption and failure. And, then by pulling thousands of live wires out of the trade unions they have robbed these organizations of tremendous support. It is safe to assume that if the large body of industrial unionists, for all these years, had stayed in the old unions, set up their ideal of industrial unionism there, and then worked for every practical measure making in that direction, we would have had an industrial union of railroad workers by now. But better late than never. This sensible policy should be followed henceforth, and a lasting goodbye said to dual unionism.
- ↑ The bitter jurisdictional warfare between the Trainmen and Switchmen resulted, among its many other evil effects, in keeping the latter organization out of the many federations mentioned in this section, and in having them practically isolated until quite recently.
- ↑ Following for simplicity's sake the terminology in use among the A. F. of L. railroad unions, a Territory will be hereafter in this booklet referred to as Division No. 1, 2 or 3, accordingly as it is Western Eastern or Southern. The railroads of Canada comprise Division No. 4 in union practice, while the Independent railroad locomotive and car equipment plants in both countries constitute Division No. 5.
- ↑ A forerunner of the all-craft movement occurred on the Chicago & Eastern Illinois in 1915, when all the trades on that road joined forces in a system federation, the first of its kind. The system federation was unique in that it comprised all the railroad crafts, and not merely several of the more closely related grroups. as had previously been the case.