USA > Massachusetts > Commonwealth history of Massachusetts, colony, province and state, volume 5 > Part 40
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In 1912 these evils existed in many forms and finally the inevitable human explosion against them took place. An in- teresting phase of the strike, although one which was to have no permanent significance, was the fact that it was fought to a successful victory under the banner of the I. W. W. It was a curious anomaly that brought the Industrial Workers of the World across the entire continent to a Massachusetts mill city. Its normal habitat is in the upper Middle West and in the Far West from British Columbia down to Mexico. Yet our staid New England streets in the city of Lawrence echoed to the tramping hundreds behind Big Bill Haywood and Ettor and Giovannitti. For months the fight was waged. Bloodshed and destruction of property marked its course until finally the strikers won a decisive victory.
EFFECT OF THE LAWRENCE STRIKE ON THE I. W. W. (1912-1913)
At the time the strike was over, the I. W. W. had 14,000 active members in the city of Lawrence alone. But, while the I. W. W. had achieved the principal purpose of the strike and had bettered the conditions of those who had gone out, yet as an organization its influence was temporary in Massa- chusetts and soon passed away.
This is not difficult to understand, inasmuch as in New Eng- land a labor union of this particular radical and doctrinaire type was planted on a soil ill-suited for its permanent devel- opment. The I. W. W. in America is syndicalistic; it proposes the abolition of the political state and the reconstruction of society by direct industrial action. In the doctrine of the "class struggle," "direct action" is interpreted as including the general strike, boycott, and sabotage.
At the time the I. W. W. was carrying the red flag through the streets of Lawrence, considerable apprehension was felt that it marked the ingress of a new and dangerous element into the labor situation of Massachusetts. As a matter of
438
LABOR MOVEMENT
fact the Lawrence strike proved that the I. W. W., even in winning a specific strike, was in reality less powerful than is generally supposed. It was not the I. W. W. which won in Lawrence; it was the fact that men were grossly underpaid and that working conditions were unbearable.
DIFFICULTIES OF THE I. W. W. (1910-1927)
The total membership of the I. W. W. at the present time is under 100,000. This membership comprises a restless, un- stabilized body of workers who have rebelled against the pres- ent economic and political order and who in their anti-social attitude and practices have discarded all suggestions for opportunistic reforms.
Many of them are "floaters," drifting in migratory move- ments through the harvest fields of the West. An excessive idealism is contained in their creed, but it is tied in no practical way to a program that will appeal to the average American worker, such as one finds dominant in the Massachusetts in- dustrial scene. Then too, American labor-and this is markedly true of Massachusetts labor-is still predominately craft-conscious and not class-conscious; and it is more sym- pathetic toward practical and immediate gains than towards proposals for an industrial Utopia.
The I. W. W. did accomplish one thing: it righted a situa- tion which today even the most violent partisans of the textile manufacturers would concede to be unjust. In fairness to the American Woolen Company, whose huge mills were the focus of the strike, it should be said that on the foundations of that strike a generous and forward-looking labor program was established by the management, which at least in great meas- ure wiped out the record of 1913. In fact, at the time of his death in 1927, William M. Wood, head of the American Woolen Company, was considered to have established in his mills a labor policy which made every possible concession to the worker consistent with the duties of the management to the stockholders.
THE PAPER INDUSTRY
Before the secret of converting wood pulp into paper was discovered, the paper industry ranked very high in Massachu-
439
LABOR SPIRIT IN MASSACHUSETTS
setts. It seemed to be entrenched in a particularly firm posi- tion because it drew from the by-products of the textile industry what it needed for raw material. Even following the day when wood pulp began to be used, Massachusetts con- tinued her supremacy in the production of fine writing paper with an output of nearly $100,000,000 in this single industry each year.
Here, as in textiles, heavy capital investment in machinery is necessary. Primarily because of this condition, no marked success has been made in the way of unionizing the workers. The demand is less and less for skilled workers, as the process of manufacture becomes increasingly controlled by machines in place of the skill of human brains and hands.
SPIRIT OF LABOR IN MASSACHUSETTS
Industrial disturbances have naturally dotted the record of the years in Massachusetts labor history. This has been in- evitable, and particularly in our state, because the great body of our workers are men and women who have rightly de- manded an increasing standard of living, who have proved themselves skilled workers beyond the average, and who have had the spirit and determination to fight if necessary for what they believed were their rights in the economic field of action.
One of the leading manufacturers of Massachusetts made a profound observation once when he said that he would con- sider it an ill day for the future of our industrial life when labor ceased to ask and fight for more than it was getting at any given time, as its share of the profits of industry. What he had in mind was not acrimonious trouble, but that "divine discontent" which has always marked the American worker and which has been particularly a Yankee trait.
The working men and women of Massachusetts have as a body faithfully endeavored to render a fair day's work for a fair day's pay and to take a creative interest in their work. Witness the efforts which have been made for years, and are still being made, by industrialists in other states to entice Mas- sachusetts labor away. It is well known that Massachusetts workers have been at such a premium in other sections of the country that agents representing competitive concerns have
440
LABOR MOVEMENT
come to Massachusetts and in an organized way tried to induce many of our skilled workers to go elsewhere. It is interesting to note that such efforts have generally been unsuccessful due to the fact that our skilled workers are too firmly rooted in their affection for Massachusetts as a place to live in.
OUTCOME OF LABOR CONTROVERSIES
This reputation which the Massachusetts worker has is well earned and as a corollary to it there has been on his part a candid recognition of his own worth and a constant demand that it be recognized. For the most part this recognition has come voluntarily from the employers of the Bay State. Our wage levels here reflect the fairness and forward-looking willingness of the employer to pay commensurately for the services rendered. Of course, in any live and pulsating indus- trial situation controversies are bound to occur. Such con- troversies are, as some employers point out, the signs of a healthy, vigorous economic situation. It is equally interesting to observe that while Massachusetts has had many industrial disputes, with the single exception of the Lawrence strike of 1912 and perhaps one or two other textile strikes, none of these dislocations have been a source of real and serious trouble.
STATISTICS OF STRIKES AND LOCKOUTS (1887-1912)
In the table below appears the record of strikes and lock- outs in Massachusetts during the past thirty years. A glance at this table will show that strikes in Massachusetts, despite the steady increase in the number of industrial concerns, have been proportionately decreasing during the past few years. The high point in the number of strikes came in 1919, when 396 industrial disturbances were recorded. An explanation of this peak number does not lie in any conditions peculiar to the industrial situation in Massachusetts. It was the year of post- war industrial troubles which swept over the entire country, and which were a part of the process of readjustment follow- ing the termination of the abnormal economic activity pro- duced by the demands of the war upon manufacturing re- sources.
441
CONCILIATION AND ARBITRATION
TABLE OF MASSACHUSETTS STRIKES AND LOCKOUTS (1887-1929)
Number
Year
Number of Strikes
Year
of Strikes
Year
Number of Strikes
1887
142
1901
258
1916
not available
1888
100
1902
245
1917
353
1889
130
1903
255
1918
347
1890
158
1904
202
1919
396
1891
145
1905
201
1920
377
1892
162
1906
213
1921
201
1893
175
1907
236
1922
139
1894
131
1908
98
1923
271
1895
74
1909
183
1924
97
1896
46
1910
242
1925
162
1897
65
1911
222
1926
113
1898
43
1912
294
1927
70
1899
77
1913-14 not available
1928
95
1900
79
1915
383
1929
77
MASSACHUSETTS BOARD OF CONCILIATION AND ARBITRATION (1886-1930)
It will be seen that the years which have followed this post- war readjustment have witnessed a steady decrease in the number of strikes until the totals for the past three years have reached the lowest marks recorded in nearly half a century. One reason for the fact that the record in Massachusetts as to industrial disputes is so low will be found in the machinery which the state has set up to handle labor troubles. One of the first states in the Union to establish a state board of con- ciliation and arbitration, Massachusetts has long set an ex- ample of the effective co-operation which the State can give to both capital and labor in adjusting the inevitable disagree- ments that arise over wages and working conditions.
While Massachusetts has in a few isolated instances per- haps failed to achieve its own high standards in meeting labor problems yet over a period of more than forty years it has set an example to other states in connection with arbitration machinery. Other states have patterned their own policies upon the progressive and essentially democratic methods which Massachusetts has consistently used, as a Common- wealth, in judicating whatever relations have existed between capital and labor within her border.
The State Board of Conciliation and Arbitration, organized
442
LABOR MOVEMENT
in 1886, consists of three members, one representing the em- ployers, one representing labor and a third member chosen by the other two. Whenever a strike or lockout is seriously threatened or has actually occurred, the law provides that the board must offer its mediatory services. The task of media- tor which the board performs requires tact and skill in bring- ing the parties together. In the final analysis every industrial dispute can be really settled only by the parties directly concerned.
A flood of legislation has inundated the country, such as the Kansas Industrial Court Act and other similar measures, which aimed at making the State an arbitrary and fully em- powered judge. A few years ago it was attracting nation- wide attention, but it has now begun to ebb. We realize today -and the fact is clearly shown by the success of the Massachu- setts system in this respect-that industry itself must meet its own responsibilities. The employers and the workers jointly must determine their mutual policies and programs of relationships. This realization has been the basis of the Mas- sachusetts law, which with other Bay State measures has been in the forefront of wise labor legislation, and has served as models for other States and other countries to copy.
METHODS OF THE MASSACHUSETTS ARBITRATION BOARD
The State board will frequently bring two discordant parties together by securing beforehand from each side a conditional compromise agreement. For example, a textile strike in two Massachusetts mills was thus successfully terminated in 1912. The hours of women workers had been reduced from 56 to 54 a week in conformity to the new state law. The hours of all other employees were similarly reduced. This brought up sharply the question of wages, the workers demanding a 15% increase and the employers being willing to give 5%. A long drawn out and bitter controversy seemed inevitable; but the State board, through separate negotiations first with one side and then with the other, was able to find a compromise figure on which both sides agreed. The very next day the permanent agreement was ratified before the board by both management and strikers.
It should be said that the State board, on the occasion of
443
EX PARTE INVESTIGATIONS
the Lawrence strike of 1912, did all in its power to prevent the disaster which occurred. The representatives of the em- ployers who were on the scene were not accustomed to the principles of collective bargaining. They were not used to acting together without specific orders from those who had financial control of the mills involved. Moreover, the strike leaders were officials of what was to the employers an outlaw labor union-the Industrial Workers of the World-who were regarded as revolutionists and dangerous agitators. The management of the mills refused to deal with them in any way. Consequently the strike had to go on until finally the employers decided that they were willing to deal with the strikers as a body and through their selected representatives.
Ex PARTE INVESTIGATIONS BY THE BOARD (1912)
Another extremely valuable function of the board is an in- vestigation in every case where mediation by the board is not followed by a settlement, for the purpose of ascertaining the cause of the walk-out or strike and of placing the responsi- bility and blame, if any, for its existence or continuance.
The value of a public investigation and the publication of its findings by the board in an important strike was illustrated in the Boston Street Car Strike of 1912. This strike followed the discharge of a number of men, apparently for joining the newly formed union or for aiding in its organization. The company replaced a large proportion of the men by strike breakers and attempted to maintain its service. It took the ground that it had filled the places of the men who had left and was operating its cars satisfactorily and that there was no strike on its lines. It refused, therefore, to confer with the strikers. The workers were willing to arbitrate but the com- pany was not. About three weeks after the strike was inaugurated, the strikers requested the board to hold an investigation.
The board held a series of hearings and made a report. In its report the board stated that the men were justified in be- lieving that "many of the employes had been discharged for joining the union, or for activity in its formation and that many of the company's cars are being operated by men whose
444
LABOR MOVEMENT
conduct does not meet the approval of the travelling public." It added a recommendation that the parties attempt by con- ference to arrive at an amicable settlement. About a week later an agreement was reached by the company and the rep- resentatives of the union, in which it was provided that certain matters with reference to which the parties were un- able to agree would be left to the State board for final decision.
ADVANTAGES OF THE MASSACHUSETTS ARBITRATION SYSTEM
Another advantage of the Massachusetts system is that, once the state's mediation activities are accepted by the parties to the dispute, the workers must return to work and remain working until the arbitration proceedings have been com- pleted. This further helps to cut down the tremendous waste in earnings and in production which rolls up so terrific a bill against industry throughout the United States every year.
A very significant aspect of the conditions affecting labor in Massachusetts has been the development of protective legis- lation. While there is today a basic similarity among the various state laws regulating hours and wages, and providing ยท compensation for injuries resulting from industrial accidents, and guarding against unsanitary and dangerous working con- ditions, it should not be forgotten that in the initiation of such state protection, Massachusetts has always been a pioneer.
EXTRA-OFFICIAL AGENCIES
Most of the efforts to better the condition of the workers by legislative enactment, have arisen within their own ranks. Nevertheless, considerable support and in some instances the initial impulse to action has come from social groups whose immediate material interests did not necessarily suggest their participation, but whose humanitarian ideals spurred them to improve the conditions of labor. This found early expression particularly in regard to the safeguarding of women and minors.
Among organizations which have been identified with such movements in Massachusetts are the Consumers League and the Women's Trade Union League. The very extensive em-
445
PUBLIC LABOR BUREAUS
ployment of women and minors in the industries of the Com- monwealth has undoubtedly made a strong appeal wherever ameliorative labor laws were under discussion; and it can hardly be denied that this characteristic of the Massachusetts labor situation has strongly influenced both the direction and the nature of the legislation elsewhere.
A glance at the statistics of employment in Massachusetts factories is interesting in this connection. The number and percentage of men, women, and minors working in Massa- chusetts industrial establishments from 1890 to 1920 were as follows :
MEN, WOMEN AND MINOR WORKERS IN MASSACHUSETTS
Men
Women
Minors
Number
%
Number
%
Number
%
1890
305,151
133,452
8,667
1900
341,783
68.7
143,109
28.7
12,556
2.6
1910
390,544
66.9
173,280
29.6
20,735
3.5
1920
478,270
67.0
212,009
29.7
23,557
3.3
PUBLIC LABOR BUREAUS (1869-1930)
In general, measures of this nature have been advocated by the workers themselves, usually through their regular organ- izations. For example, it was primarily in response to peti- tions by the labor unions that Massachusetts established in 1869 a bureau for the investigation of labor conditions, the first permanent state bureau of its kind in the world. As an initial step toward the sane and systematic consideration of the elements to be dealt with under an industrial civilization, this was epoch making. The example was followed by the Federal Government, which in 1884 created the Department of Labor; and similar departments are functioning today in forty states as well as in practically all nations where the rise of modern industrial technique has created differences of in- terest between capital and labor.
These fact-finding labor bureaus are barometers of what is taking place in the various important phases of labor activity throughout the industrial world today. Their importance cannot be overestimated because they represent a step toward
446
LABOR MOVEMENT
placing business and industry on a scientific basis and permit the better comprehension of labor problems by this clearing- house method of assembling, digesting, and making public the essential and ever-changing facts concerning labor. It was Massachusetts that blazed the way in setting up this labor machinery years before the other states saw its wisdom. The figures and percentages covering the two latest periods in the ten leading manufacturing industries of the Commonwealth are as follows :
TEN LEADING INDUSTRIES IN MASSACHUSETTS IN 1909
Men
Women
Minors
Boots and Shoes
Number 53,243
%
Number % 26,746 32.2
Number 3,073
3.7
Cotton Goods
55,765
51.2
46,942
43.1
6,208
5.7
Woolen, Worsted & Felt Goods
30,277
56.2
20,472
38.0
3,124
5.8
Foundry and Machine Shop Products
42,942
97.2
663
1.5
574
1.3
Printing and Publishing
12,290
70.1
4,751
27.1
491
2.8
Slaughtering and Meat Packing
3,265
98.2
36
1.1
24
0.7
Paper and Wood Pulp
8,364
65.1
4,355
33.9
129
1.0
Leather
10,067
98.2
133
1.3
52
0.5
Electrical Machinery (1)
11,432
78.8
2,945
20.3
130
0.9
Bread and other Bakery Prod-
ucts
5,244 78.3
1,272
19.0
181
2.7
TEN LEADING INDUSTRIES IN MASSACHUSETTS IN 1919
Men
Women
Minors
Cotton Goods
64,475
51.0
50,919
43.2
7,105
5.8
Boots and Shoes
48,340
60.3
28,619
35.7
3,207
4.0
Worsted Goods
18,801
51.8
15,208
41.9
2,287
6.3
Leather
13,783
90.8
1,245
8.2
152
1.0
Foundry and Machine Products
Shop
48,936
94.7
2,323
4.5
411
0.8
Slaughtering and Meat Packing
4,207
97.7
91
2.1
9
0.2
Woolen Goods
12,016
68.4
5,147
29.3
405
2.3
Rubber Tires, tubes and other goods
7,995
85.0
1,317
14.0
94
1.0
Electrical Machinery (1)
17,773
74.4
5,924
24.8
192
0.8
Paper and Wood Pulp
9,551
73.7
3,357
25.9
52
0.4
Number
%
Number
%
Number
%
%
64.1
(1) Includes electrical apparatus and supplies
While some changes are noted in the relative importance of the industries in the thirty-year period covered by these tables, it is true that women have always been numerous in the textile, boot and shoe, rubber shoe and confec- tionary industries. The expansion of electrical products has also brought to the fore a great industry where women workers are highly valued.
447
MINIMUM-WAGE LAWS
OTHER LEGAL REGULATIONS OF LABOR
One of the labor laws initiated in this State which attracted widespread interest and controversy was the minimum-wage law. This was far from being the first intrusion of the state between employer and employees in the matter of wages. During a long period of years Massachusetts has adopted laws to forbid the assignment of wages to secure loans; to require the payment of wages in working hours in factories employ- ing 100 or more workers; to forbid mulcting of workers through the "company store"; and to make wages a preferred claim against the employer. A requirement especially in the interests of women and minors provided that no deductions shall be made from their wages where breakdown of ma- chinery involves stoppage of work, if the employees are re- quired to remain upon the premises.
PRINCIPLES OF MINIMUM-WAGE LAWS
The minimum-wage law involves a new principle-the set- ting of a wage, based not on the cost of production or the pressure of competition but upon the living requirements of the employee. This principle obtained wide application during the war period, when wage agreements and wage scales af- fecting large groups were based upon cost of living investiga- tions. It still plays a very considerable part in wage negotiations of the present.
In 1912, however, when the Massachusetts minimum-wage law was enacted, this principle had received little practical recognition in the setting of wage scales. That legislation was destined to put in motion a series of similar laws in other states, designed to ensure to women workers a fair living wage; and they were followed by a series of suits attacking their constitutionality. Among the most important were the cases in the Supreme Court on the Oregon act in 1914 and 1917; and in 1923 the United States Supreme Court decision to the effect that the District of Columbia act, in so far as it applied to women workers, is unconstitutional. It will be seen, therefore, that the Massachusetts act has an importance in the general trend of the labor movement which transcends its effects within the borders of the state.
448
LABOR MOVEMENT
MASSACHUSETTS MINIMUM-WAGE LAW
What were the provisions of this minimum-wage law and what its more immediate effects? Provision is made for in- vestigation, in any particular occupation, of the wages paid to female employees; and for determination whether such wages will "supply the necessary cost of living and maintain the worker in health." An adequate wage based upon such an investigation is fixed by a joint wage board of employers, employees and representatives of the public. If the wage rate thus determined is accepted, it is put into effect and the names of employers failing to adopt it are advertised in the news- papers. The law, therefore, is not mandatory and its only teeth are the threat of publicity to those failing to comply. A recent refusal by the Boston Transcript to publish the name of a delinquent shows the weakness of this recommendatory type of law.
The working of the law has been only partially satisfactory, because of the difficulty of enforcement, the slowness of its working, and the clumsiness of the wage-board machinery. As most of the wage rates were set during a period of rising wages, the competitive minimum rate frequently was higher or soon became higher than the minimum rate. Where the wage market was little affected by competition, however, the majority of the employees were paid the minimum rate or less.
The significance of the Massachusetts minimum wage law is rather in the educational effect which it had on public opinion both within the Commonwealth and over the whole country. Through the attention which it turned upon condi- tions of employment it made a large contribution to the estab- lishment of that enlightened attitude which holds that the ultimate success of any industry must be based on the human welfare of its employees as well as on the profits of its stock- holders.
HOURS OF LABOR (1842-1930)
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