# The Railroaders' Next Step—Amalgamation/Chapter 6

CHAPTER VI.
ADVANTAGES AND OBJECTIONS
The supreme advantages of the amalgamation of all the railroad craft unions into one industrial union would be, of course, the enormous increase in economic power coming from the greater scope of activity, intensified solidarity and clearer vision of the larger body. From a series of detached, semi-organized fragments, incapable of outlining a real general program, or of making a concerted fight for it, the army of the railroad workers would be transformed into a co-ordinated whole, animated by a common purpose for every man in the industry and able to exert united, tremendous strength to achieve it.
But there would be other, special advantages. One of these is the killing of the dual industrial union idea. In Chapter II we have seen something of the ravages caused by this idea; how for over thirty years the old unions have been devitalized by the loss of thousands and thousands of first class militants who have quit them to start new organizations. And unless this splitting off tendency is stopped it may well result, some time or other, in a general smashup of the unions that will set them back for many years. Only the amalgamation of the craft unions into an industrial union can put an end to this standing menace. Once such a combination is brought about then many invaluable militants, now lost to the movement, will devote their great potential strength to the productive work of building up the fused organization.
Amalgamation would also stop the many jurisdictional wars that now sap the strength of the railroad trade unions. Sidney Webb, a well-known English labor writer, once said that trade unions lose 90 per cent of their efficiency because of fighting among themselves. That there is much truth ​in this assertion railroad men know to their cost. Who can estimate the serious injuries wrought our cause by the long-drawn, fratricidal struggle between the Trainmen and the Switchmen? And that is only one of many. Except for amalgamation, there is no cure for such jurisdictional disputes between closely related railroad trades. So long as these trades are in different unions (even though federated) just so long will they steal each other's members and work, and just so long will internecine fights go on between them and ruin their efficiency. Only when they actually fuse together can these clashes cease. In an amalgamated organization there are no separate sets of officials, each preaching craft prejudices, and each trying to fatten its particular trade at the expense of the others. On the contrary, the officialdom of all industrial unions is homogenuous. Its point of view is the welfare of all the workers in the industry; it naturally seeks the elimination of craft narrownesses, not their perpetuation. Hence, what few spats do occur between the various groups are easily settled in a spirit of brotherhood.
Further advantages of amalgamation would result from large financial economies. Merging the sixteen national headquarters into one would make a great saving. Likewise the combination of the sixteen staffs of general officers and organizers. As things now stand the waste in handling the business of railroad workers is enormous. Duplication of effort occurs to an unbelievable extent. The sixteen groups of officials run over the country without regard to each other. No real system or co-operation exists anywhere. Often local unions of one organization are allowed to fall to pieces for want of attention, while at the same time a half dozen paid organizers of the other trades are in the locality and not over-burdened with work; it is a common occurrence for two or more craft system chairmen to travel hundreds of miles together at big expense to look after some-trifling grievance or organization detail that one could attend to as well; and so on with similar ​nonsense that a modern business concern would not tolerate for a second.
A general amalgamation woujld speedily straighten all that out. The work of administration would be unified and systematized throughout. With the departmental system in effect, vice-presidents, chairman and organizers would look after several (as many as circumstances permitted) categories of workers—for everyone who has had contact with industrial unions such as the United Mine Workers knows how ridiculous is the current craft union notion that an official can represent and attend to only one trade, his own, efficiently. The saving in energy and money from this one item would be great. Moreover, the railroaders' affairs would be much better taken care of, and many organizers would be rendered available to unionize the vast armies of non-union workers employed in the independent railroad equipment plants and on the industrial railroads.
Additional financial economies would result from the new convention system. The present order of things is ruinously extravagant. Each of the sixteen organizations holds its own convention at enormous expense. With often as high as two or three thousand local union delegates in attendance (most of whom look upon such affairs as mere vacation trips) the cost runs from $100,000 to $500,000 apiece. The natural result of such absurdities is that conventions are becoming fewer and fewer. But with a general industrial union, basing its convention representation upon the system amalgamation instead of the local union, there would be only a few hundred delegates in attendance, and they would be there for business. National assemblies could be held annually for a fraction of what it now costs for the mass craft gatherings, misnamed conventions.
Some Objections Answered
From the standpoint of the workers' interests there are no valid objections to the amalgamation we propose. The bewhiskered contention that the various crafts of skilled ​workers would be swamped by each other and especially by the masses of unskilled, and their interests neglected, was exploded long ago. It will not bear investigation. The same reactionary cry was raised when it was urged a few years ago to admit helpers and handymen into some of the unions. But the prophesied dire calamity did not happen, nor would it occur in the proposed amalgamation. All over Europe there are industrial unions of building trades, metal trades, clothing trades, printing trades, railroad trades, etc., and the various groups composing them function freely and effectively. It is a matter of common knowledge that the skilled workers, in American and every other country, are well able to take care of themselves in any kind of a labor organization.
Those who fear the skilled workers being overwhelmed reason from wrong premises. They take it for granted that the latter have a free will choice in the matter, that they can co-operate with the mass or not, just as they see fit. But this is decidedly not the case. With the constantly increasing pressure against them, the skilled workers can no longer prosper going it alone; they are compelled to seek the assistance of each other and of the unskilled. It is a question of compulsion. By force of circumstances the skilled workers are compelled to compose their craft differences and to act with the mass. At first they try to do so by federation; but eventually, because of the imperfections of this type of organization, they are brought to amalgamation. In this way alone can they achieve the power they must have. With the skilled workers' unions, even as with those of the unskilled, the alternative is, "Amalgamation or annihilation."
Another objection (although a shameful one indeed to come from a movement based on the principle of "an injury to one is the concern of all") that is levelled against all projects to affiliate the trades more closely together is the assertion that in a general railroad amalgamation the strongest organized trades would have to pull chestnuts ​out of the fire for the weaker ones. Because the skilled workers have been unable to pierce its seeming truth, this pitiable sophistry has served to wreck many a promising get-together movement. Always contrary to fact, even when some of the trades were entirely unorganized, it no longer has a semblance of verity. Today every branch of the railroad service is so thoroughly organized that even the blindest cannot help seeing, if they only will, that each of the sixteen unions would add great strength to a railroad industrial union. Indeed, some of the trades long considered weaker sisters, are now in a position, if it came to a struggle, to give a better account of themselves, than many other crafts who take great pride in their skill, organization and stragetic position in the industry. There is no longer even a pretense of a reason for the trades not to join each other in closest alliance. All would be gainers from such co-operation.
A favorite argument against every improvement in the unions is the contention that the trade unions in this country are the most effective of any in the world, coupled with citations of the higher wages prevailing in the United States to prove it. That wages are higher here than almost anywhere else is incontestable; but to say that the superior efficiency of our organizations is responsible for them is ridiculous. Anyone acquainted with the facts knows that in many respects our movement lags behind that of Europe. Rather the credit for our higher wages is due to the unprecedented development of America's marvelous resources, which has made our fight easier than in other countries. But in any event the more we improve our unions the better results we will get, and amalgamation is always a great improvement.
Old-time craft unionists also object that the great size of the proposed amalgamation would make it unwieldly and unworkable. But there is no bottom to that contention either. The fact is there are many such gigantic combinations already afoot and functioning successfully, and ​with more in prospect. In Germany, for instance, there is the monster metal workers* union, with 1,800,000 members, ranging from jewelry workers to shipbuilders and steel makers. The German railroaders, who are organized chiefly into two unions, are also about to combine (if they have not already done so) with the telegraph, telephone and postal workers, which will give this great transportation-communication organization more than 1,500,000 adherents. The British mine workers' union numbers almost 1,000,000 members. Practically the entire Belgian working class is organized in twelve industrial unions, and now a plan is being put into effect to combine all these industrial unions into one gigantic all-inclusive organization to cover the whole working class. The Australian trade unions went on record recently for a similar project. The possibilities of labor unions outstrip even the dreams of orthodox craft unionists.
All these great combinations of labor, and many more that could be mentioned, have grown gradually through voluntary federation and amalgamation. They are the fruits of practical experience. The rapidity with which they are growing and multiplying is a standing proof of their superiority over the primitive, narrow types. The workers composing them have learned through actual practice that only by massing themselves into such enormous aggregations can they properly defend their interests. No, the argument about size will not serve. If European workers can successfully construct such large organizations, so can American workers.
A more powerful objection to amalgamation, however, than any of the foregoing is one that is never expressed by those holding it; viz, the fear of the higher officials of the craft unions concerned that in the new, more economically operated industrial union they will lose their authority, and probably their very jobs. This fear is by far the most serious hindrance to amalgamation; it always does more to block the fusing of labor organizations than any ​other factor. Few officials can rise above it. No matter how badly amalgamation may be needed, the almost invariable attitude of officialdom is to fight against it relentlessly. This is so well-known as to be a commonplace of the labor movement. Therefore, all over the world genuine amalgamation movements have to surge up from the rank and file.
Unquestionably there would be considerable justification for some of this job-fear in a general railroad amalgamation. Instead of sixteen presidents, as now, then there would be only one. The rest would have to play second fiddle, with a certain restriction of their power and prestige, and also a very probable trimming of their salaries down to more modest sizes. But as for an actual reduction in the number of officials, that does not usually occur in amalgamations. There is always so much work to be done in an organizing and administering way, and the amalgamated unions are so much better able to go ahead with it than were the individual unions, that the tendency is rather to increase the staff than to decrease it. But let that be as it may, earnest railroad union men will never let such considerations stand in the way of the combination of our many weak organizations into one strong one.