The Birmingham age-herald., 1902-07-20
Convention Adopts MitchGIIs Plan and Appeals to
 Public for Aid
ISSUES STATEMENT OF
 THEIR SIDE OF TROUBLE
Assessment Is Levied on All Unions and Permission Is Given for Com mittees to Gall Upon Busi-
 ness Men for Help.

Indianapolis, July 1s-At 1 o'clock this afternoon the convention of United Mine Workers adjourned after declaring against a general strike providing for the raising of a fund with which to aid the striking anthracite miners and issu- ing an appeal to the American people for support.
 The recommendations brought in by the special committee appointed in the ex- ecutive session of yesterday and which are practically identical with those sug- gested by President Mitchell in his ad- dress on the first day of the convention and unanimously adopted by the conven- ton are as follows:
 '1. That the national treasurer be au- thorized and directed to immediately ap- propriate s50.0OO from the funds of the national treasury and place it at the dis posal of the officers of districts Nos. 1, and g, (the anthracite districts).
 "2. That all districts, sub-districts and local unions be appealed to- to donate from the surplus in their treasury as large an amount as they can afford
 'S. That an assessment of 10 per cent be levied on the gross earnings of all mem bers of local unions in districts Nos. 6, 8, 12. 19. 2S and 25 and an assessment of $1 per week upon all members of local unions in Districts Nos. 2 5, il, 1S IA. 15, 16, 20 and H. The members of districts now on strike which may resume work before this assessment has been removed shall be assessed either 10 per cent of their gross earnings or $1 per week which ever their district may decide from the time work Is resumed
 To Be Paid Direct.
 "A. The assessment shall De paid direct from the local unions to the national secretary and the local unions will be held responsible for the payment of the same.
 ''5. An assessment of 25 per cent will be levied upon the wages, salary or per- centage received from the organization of all national. district and sub-district officers and organizers.
 ''6. The assessment shall begin with the 16th of July, 1902.
 '7 All contributions made from the na- tional office to the anthracite region will be divided pro rata to each anthracite district in accordance with the number of miners and mine laborers in each of
 
 reports
 ''S That the following circular be is- sued to the American people," CThe cir cular follows); "The following amendment submitted by President Nicholas of anthracite Dis trlct No. 1 was included:
 That each local union in the regions that are at work select a committee which shall secure work for as many of the men on strike as possible in the lo- cality where the local union is situated, and that the local inform secretaries of the strike districts of the number of men needed. the kind of work. wages and arrangements for transportation. That the same proposition be submitted to all local unions in the American Fed eration of Labor.
 ''9 That the circular to our local unions shall include recommendation that committees be appointed to canvass the business men and other citizens of their localities for subscriptions"
 Address to the Public.
 The address of the convention to the public is in chief as follows:
 "As miners of coal we view with the exalted pride the wonderful industrial development of the past fifteen decades, with all the attending influences upon the present civilization which 1t has pro- duced.
 But when we look upon the enormous fortunes that our labor has made pos sible with the innumerable comforts and luxuries that 1t brings to the people at large and then examine the paltry sum we receive as wages for the labor we have to perfom, the dangers we undergo the dampness we must endure, the foul air we must breathe and the peculiar rheumatic and lung troubles superin- duced by these conditions which we must bear, we naturally feel that we are be- ing unjustly dealt with in the small amount of this worlds goods which we receive in return for so much labor and so many sacrifices. "The great combinations of capital which control the coal industry have be- come so powerful that no miner can hope, through his individual efforts. to secure a just share of the wealth which his labor produced. The history of in- dustrial development in the past has shown that when capital combines the workers must associate, else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in the struggle for existence. rThe extremely low wages paid to an- thracite miners; the refusal of the coal companies to have the coal property weighed. or permit the miners to employ a man at their own expense to see the coal they have mined weighed. measured or credited the great number or hours the miners must work each day in the most unsanitary conditions; the cruel and unjust manner in which they nave been treated by petty bosses clothed with little brief authority; the arbitrary as sumption by the employers that neither the miners nor the public have any rights that are entitled to consideration by them, have forced us to organize not for the purpose of taking from the operators that which belongs to them, but for end by concilistory methods, by submit- treatment than we have received in the past and fair recompense for our labor
 Kind Methods Fall. We have sought to accomplish this end by oonciiatory methods. by submit ting disputed points to arbitration and by cessation work upon the terms offer ed us, commonly spoken of as strikes when all otker means of adjusting the grievances complained of have failed. As proof of our sincerity we point to the lContinrsad nv, Qeeond p~rn1