The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1903-08-15
The Sympathetic Strike.
BY Ethelbert Stewart in the National Progress:


The difference of opinion that exists ,
regarding this subject is, in the last
analysis, the same difference that di-
vides the individualists from the al
TRUSTS; the me-ists from the we-ists. 1t
began with the question: ''Am I my
brothers keeper" This question, ORR
ginating in the mind of his brothers
slayer, has received a negative answer
IN the minds of all subsequent homi-
cides, economic, Industrial and social.
But there is economic homicide in the
second degree, also. 1t consists in at
tending to your own business strictly
while some big fellow kills a little fell
low before your eyes; when by uniting
low you could have prevented the
tragedy and compelled the big fellow
to behave himself Transfer the situa-
ton to the industrial affairs of life and
you have the reason for the sympa-
thetic strike.
Let us thoroughly understand what
is meant by the term; what sympa-
thetic strike really is. It is a strike
by members of one union, or trade,
over any matter affecting others, but
not directly connected with the affairs
Of that union, or the business of that
trade. It is labor's doctrine of ''the
community of INTERESTS which cap
italists find so helpful to them. A few
references to great sympathetic strikes
will make clear the reasoning, feeling
and sentiment underlying them. For
years certain brick yards in Chicago
were unorganized. Every effort to get
better labor conditions, or better wages
in them proved futile. Union after
union was formed only to be crushed
in embryo by the powerful opposition.
Women were employed in these yards.
Wages were SO low that man and his
wife and whole family were required to
| labor to exc out bare subsistence.
Year after year struggles, strikes, black
lists, defeats occurred; year after year
apeals from the weak to the strong
| were made. Finally the Bricklayers
Union Of Chicago responded to the ap-
| peal, and said: 1--WE will not lay brick
| made under such inhuman conditions;
humanize your brickyards or we will
not use your product. And" they add
ed, the only way We can know
whether or not you have hu1manized
your yards is for us to know that you
have 'unionized them. Henceforth only
union-made brick will be used in Chi
cago." Strike after strike, lockout after
lockout, followed. Men earning four
and half dollars day of eight hours
lost weeks and months Of labor to help
men in brickyards earn enough in ten
hours to keep their wives from push
ing whee1barrows in those selfsame
brickyards. Bricklayers' wives went
without things they liked that brick
makers wives might be at least human.
The struggle lasted six months; with
out the aid of the bricklayers it had
already lasted years. The hod carriers
and building laborers had a similar
struggle. The sbricklayers, carpenters
and plasterers: declined to fight for
then, hence they. always lost: 2 Finally
/ this aristocracy ct IL Dor, il the building
trades, became Summarized The evolll-
tionary. progresses Of life began to
Christ1anize them, and they Instituted
sympathetic strikes for the weak, for
had carriers and mere men. For in
asmuch as We have done it. unto the
least of one of':@these We have done it
unto me-" The Jesus-purpose of civil
cation is to elevate the bottom, not to
make peaks at the top.
Make 40 more giants, God,
But elevate the race at once"
The woodworkers in the sash, door
and blind factories, the furniture shops,
were, wherever employed, lifted out of
an almost intolerable condition by a
sympathetic strike on the part Of the
carpenters. The cutters have helped,
and will some day save the sweatshop
victims. The Debs strike, so-called,
was case where men earning high
wages on railroads lost their wages for
months, and in thousands Of cases their
situations entirely in an effort to help
men and women elsewhere earn living
wages. From the standpoint of the
political economists, viewed from the
mexim ''No friendship in business" all
such strikes are the acme Of foolishness.
If these men win they win only for
others; it is not a penny to them at
best, while, if they lose, they stand all
the loss alone, and yet no appeal to
their selflshness can prevent them from
doing it. There is something in the
heart Of man, eternally bobbing up to
be crucif1ed, that has always appeared
unto the Greeks, foolishness.'
No doubt there has been much de-
structive haste in this matter Of strikes,
both sympathetic and other. In 1900
the building contractors instituted a
community Of interests in a lockout
against sympathetic strikes. and par
TALLY won. SINCE then most wage
agreements in these trades, both in
New York and Chicago, contain a
clause against such manifestations of
sympathy. There are, however, forty
eight trades organized in the stock
yards of Chicago; forty-three in the
building trades of New York, and over
forty in the same trades in Chicago,
Some Of these trades are intrinsically
unimportant, others are numerically
weak, and if deprived of all support
from the larger organizations in the
same industry they would be unable to
maintain thamSo1vaS in anv Str1,o11o