New-York tribune., 1903-07-13
A STAMPEDE EXPECTED.
Em ployerS Think Men VIII Return
1cith Rush.

Final action is to be taken to-day by the Board
of Building Trades the plan of arbitration
Of the Building Trades Employers Association
which is to be made a special order of business.
How much any action the board may take VIII
affect the situation nobody could say yesterday
If the unions generally accept the plan the walk
ing delegates or business agents. who form the
board and receive salaries paid by the unions
will be practically powerless. While the ques-
tion is in the balance the walking delegates
who are fighting for their old power, may delay
acceptance. possibly prevent some of the
unions from accepting the plan
The unions in the Parks faction of the board,
it is said. may try to swing the board into line,
and through the board the unions which have
not yet signed the plan into rejecting it, Judg-
ing from the attitude OF some of the business
agents, it does not look If the board can do
much to oppose the acceptance of the plan.
Edward Kelly. business agent Of the Electri-
cal Workers Union. which on Saturday told the
board of governors of the Building Trades En-
ployers' Association that II had accepted the
plan said yesterday that he did not see any
thing far wrong in the plan Of arbitration. He
continued:
l think, after all, the whole fight might have
been avoided easily. do not believe that the
worth a fight which threw a hundred thousand
people idle for two months. Any who reads
1t in an unprejudiced way can come to no con-
ciuSlon other than that if it was accepted by
all the unions and work begun over again. it
would leave conditions about the same as they
were before the shutdowa took place. except
that there will be fewer strikes for some time
Nobody who looks at the matter candidly can
CONCEIVE that there will ever be = time when
there will he no strikes and no troubles between
employer and enlploye For this. if for no other
reason, the plan Of arbitration was not worth
all the trouble that was taken about it
Kelly believed, he said that while the shut
down was ending. it would take more than a
week or two weeks to restore matters to the
status existing before the shutdown The mem
bers of his organization would go to work to-
day, he declared, as well as those of a number
of other unions, but he would not estimate the
number ef men likely to go back to work this
week under the arbitration agreement.
The board of governors Of the Employers As
sociation will meet to-day in the Townsend
Building No. 1,123 Broadway. to arrange for
the men returning to work. and%o hear reports
from additional unions which may have ac-
cepted the plan in the mean time Employers
who were seen We're under the impression that
from thirty thousand to fifty thousand men
were likely to go back to work under the plan
of arbitration this week. This would be such a
break in the ranks of the unions that a STAN
pede of the remaining unions in favor of the
plan likely to result.
At yesterdays meeting of the Central FEEDER
ated Union William Tobin. delegate of the mar
BILE workers unions reported that a general
lockout Of the marble industry went into effect
last Friday, affecting sixteen hundred men.
This included the marble cutters, machine
stone workers, marble pOlishers', marble rub
hers and sawyers' and marble workers help
ers' unions. The reason given by the en-
ployers for the lockout he said, that such
a quantity of material had accumulated in the
shops that it would he a long time before it
used.
The real reason" he continued. lis that the
manufa aCturers belong to the Building Trades
Employers Association and they want to force
us to accept their plan of arbitration First the
unions had the original plan, then an amended
plan. and afterward the third plan, with eX-
plantations; but the marble workers unions VIII
not accept the plan under any circumstances.
We have already agreement with the en-
ployers for two years, which does not end for
some -