The record-union., 1898-12-13
The American Federation Of Labor
Meets in Kansas City. !.
About One Hundred and Fifty Delegates
From All Parts Of the Country Present.
President Gompers Delivers His
Annual Address, Treating With
Matters to Come Before the
Convention, and Stating the
Objections Of the Federation to
the Policy Of GOVERNMENT Ex-
pansion.

the FO11cy or G0Verenment EX-
pansion.
KANSAS CITY, Dec. 12-The eight
eenth annual convention Of the Ameri-
can Federation Of Labor met this
morning. About 100 delegates from
all parts of this country were present,
also William Thornton and William
Inskip of London, representing the
British Trade Unions Congress- Their
mission is to plead for a closer alliance
between the United States and the
mother country, along industrial as
well as political lines.
The work mapped out for the open
ing day included the committee re-
ports. the seating and rejection of con-
tested delegates, of which there are
several, and the annual address of
President Gompers
President Evans Of the Kansas City
Commercial Club welcomed the dele
gates, President Gompers responding.
After disposing of the usual prelim-
mary matters OF organization, Mr..
Gompers delivered his annual address,
which was received with much enthusi-
asm.
Mr.. Gompers, referring to the growth
OF Internationally said:
With the view of a closer bond of
sympathy and unity among the organ
lied workers of the different countries,
correspondence with many Of them
have been maintained, and entered in
to with number of others. From
the officers of our affiliated unions
come the satisfactory reports that they
are in closer touch with their fellow
trade unionists everywhere, and it is
additionally gratifying that the mutual
recognition, exchange and acceptance
of union cards is being adopted inter
nationally.
with each step taken in the direc-
ton to cement the bond of fraternity
and the recognition Of the principle
Of solidarity in the national labor
movement, we shall not only help to
bear each others burdens, but contin-
ually make those burdens lighter, and
be the lever for that international
brotherhood of man when the warE of
the nations shall be thing of the
past, and the song from the poet, the
dream Of the philosopher and the hope
of the philantrophist and humanitarian
be achieved.
Our fraternal delegates to the Brit
ish Trade Union Congress, James Dun
can and Harry Lloyd, report that the
greetings which they received at the
hands Of our fellow-trade unionists
abroad were of a marked. generous
and gratifying character We have
with US to-day the return fraternal
delegates from the British Trade Union
Congress to our convention, William
Inskip and william Thornton, men
who have given the best years of their
lives to the organization of the work
ers and the uplifting Of the masses of
labor.
For the first time the convention
last year elected a fraternal delegate
ada, Thomas l. Kidd, who, too, reports
the cordiality of his greeting and the
interest in his mission Our Canadian
have honored us by
the election of a delegate to attend
this convention in the person of D. A.
Carey"
Under the head of mo Duality
Greater Federation" he said:
"As a result of the engineers strike
of Great Britain. combination and
closer federation of all is the one point
to which the labor movement there is
at present directed, and duality organ
iZation in one trade so long prevailing
in Great Britain is fast passing away.
Our declaration that no two organiza-
tions of one trade, claiming equal ju-
risdictions can exist without conflict
and injury, the principle long ago rec
ognized and established of one union
and one trade, has been taken as the
slogan of the labor movement of Great
Britain, and we shall soon see a solidi-
fed army Of labor there upon the most
perfect lines to achieve success.
And this state of affairs teaches us
a lesson, too; that in struggling for
the upbuilding Of national and inter-
national trade unionism, and also for
the integrity and entity
of the trade union, and with the de-
velopment of industry and the con-
centration of wealth, it becomes the
bounded duty of our trade unions to
not only morally but financially con-
centrate their efforts in battle Of
fensive or defensive when any allied
is engaged in conflict"
Referring to the Pana and Virden
strikes, Mr.. Gompers said:
1.-The operators sought to break their
agreement and the strike by import
ing a horde of ex-convict negro cheap
laborers from Alabama, displacing them
under an armed guard Of Pfnkerton
thugs and hirelings. That bloodshed
would ensue with an ignorant mass of
men armed to do the bidding Of charac-
terless men could easily be foreseen.
Governor Tanner recognized the band
of men armed as contrary to the laws
of the State, and forbade entrance to
others, and finally appreciating the
strained condition of affairs, he de-
clared martial law and insisted upon
the disarmament of ALL
He concludes this paragraph with
statement of matters taking a better
form there, with the promise of a salts
factory settlement.
Mr. Gompers stated the objections of
the Federation to the policy of imperial
ism and expansion as follows:
1--WE cannot annex the Philippines
without a large increase in our stand
ing army. A large standing army is
repugnant to Republican institutions
and a menace to the liberty of o1,r own