The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1909-08-20

'h'H' Nhi'h polhlo lHc GENITAL IllilloS-
ophy of the age, Darwin himself wrote
the most simply. Leaders of men there
be in plenty who have their press agents,
franked envelopes and special CORES
pondents to set forth their fame.
But Pratt isn't leader of that sort.
He works with his coat off. When he
is through he puts it on and goes home,
and if you happen to have been close to
him in the thick of his battlc-for his
whole life has been spent in the storm
centers of the labor strikes he will
likely have left you much to think
about.
A strike maker is Pratt he corm-
try's only professional striker. We
have heard much of Farley, who breaks
EN-" but he's a helpless individual when
matched against Pratt, the newer pro
duct-ther maker. In II chance to buck
up against Pratt some years ago
Farley did not hesitate This June he
had another chance and he sent word to
the company that it had better settle
that Pratt had all the best of the argu-
ment. And the company. didn't believe
Farley it hired strike breakers from
another agency. The result was far
different from what the company had
counted on. Then it believed Farley,
and called Pratt in for a conference. In
stead of brickbats he had won with po-
ems of Ella Wheeler Wilcox; and won
where nobody but Pratt ever thought
he stood fraction of a chance to win,
including the men that responded to his
persuasive oratory and quit their Jobs.
Having developed the profession OF
strike making and brought himself for
ward as its only living exponent, it is
pleasing to note that Pratt has made
his work go. In ten years he has
pulled off no less than Il dozen strikes
and as their net consequence he sets
forth that he has carried a little more
sunshine. a little more food, and little
more rest into the homes of thousands
of street car workers, in cities that eN-
tend from Philadelphia to San Francisco,
and take in Chicago, Cleveland, Butte,
Salt Lake. Louisville, Nashville, Knox
Vile and Lexington on the way.
There are other cities, of course. Pratt
has been to every street ear strike in
the last ten years, and he is likely to
be present at those of the next ten. In
June he wound up big strike in Phila-
delpha successfully, and almost before
he had told his wife and children about
it at their little home in Welshteld, just
ont side of Cleveland. he was summoned
in haste to Chicago to 90 into the har-
ness there.
To build oneself up into profession
representing the latest step i'll the eco
nomic battle for the adjustment of Iiles
rewards and penalties isn't work OF a
day. Darwin tells us that forgotten
yesterdays had very much to do with
whatever we see full blown to-day
Through those years that the Haywoods
and the Movers and the men OF the Nio-
lence schools were running their course,
Pratt was thinking hard, and working
out an idea.
This idea is the one that has since
furnished the steam for his life-work,
and being its servant, he is not proud OF
what he accomplishes in its name, ana
strike as if he had seen come about only
what he knew must come, when once
certain conditions were provided.
For two kinds of strikes Pratt has no
use. One is the strike that someone
else has made, and the other is the
strike that violates the law. He uses
many more pointed sentences than
brickbats in his battles, and public op'n-
ion is the weapon to whose force he
mostly caters. We all remember the
days of sisters jersey and brother
toothpick. pointed shoes, and in those
days Dickens fascinated us, while the
tbree. decker novel did not look forbid
ding. | don't know whether the men
of genius in this day are writing great
poems or chiseling great words in mar
BILE or spreading them upon canvas
Rut this | do know-that watching
Clarence O. Pratt, the black-eyed, black
haired strike maker, in the midst of his
work, holds much more fascination fol
me than has anything encountered since
the days first knew Dickens and ieI'
his charm.
II all seems so new. There's moth
ING Won expect from striker that Pratt
does And as each hour brings nearer
the dramatic crisis in which his battles
finish. YOU can sometimes catch a glimpse
of the master hand in the act of guiding
events to their inevitable end Hi'
strikes are pure tactics They are eaii
eded at a psychological moment. Anger
especially blind anger-is totally ell
minated.
In Philadelphia | reached the city al
midnight, and at three o'clock in th'
morning located Pratt coming out O.
his eighteenth meeting that night, liz