The labor argus. [volume] (Charleston, W. Va.) 1906-1915, 1910-05-12

try and IN the production of meat the
unions have not only been unable to inn
prove or even to maintain conditions, but
the organizations themselves have been
almost entirely wiped 6ht of existence
But these great trusts are the advance
guard of industrial development They
are the pattern toward which all industry
is evolving. Yet with these monsters of
industry the union seems unable to
cope.
The reason for this il not hard to see
The union was born of competition. 1t
depended upon Observation-Disclosures
depended for success upon the fact that
stopping the profits of one capitalist or
set of capitalists gave it's competitors
such an advantage that he was willing to
grant something to his workers before he
was completely eliminated from the world
of business
Today the union confronts, not com
petitive industry, but trustified power
When employees of the steel trust strike
IN Pittsburg profits still flow in at Gary
and South Chicago. Even if all the
profits is all that is changedngardaklit.-
plants are shut down the time of receiv-
ing p rofits are all that is changed; the
quantity may remain the same. Even if
wages be increased the monopoly can still
shift the increase cost to price, and the
worker has gained but little.
While the capitalists have grown
more powerful on the economic ground
they have grown still more rapidly on the
political field
For centuries the fiction has beep
maintained that the courts stood above
individual and class distinctions. Today
the fiction has been cast aside The
courts have become the open tools of the
employing class, and in the injunction
| they have forged the weapon against
which the union, by itself. is almost help.
less.
1t is not alone that the old weapons of
! the exploiters have grown more powerful,
New and still more effective weapons
have been added.
This does not mean that the unions
have outlived their usefulness 1t does
not mean that organized resistance to
oppression must be in vain. On the con.
trary, these conditions call only for new
methods of organization and new weap-
ons OF defense on the part of labor
Concentrate economic power on the
part of the exploiters must be met with
wider and more compact organization on
the part of labor. When competition dis
| appeared between capitalists it was the
signal that division in the ranks of labor
were outgrown.
! When capitalists tore the judicial er-
| mine from the judge and dragged it in
the mire or class justice. they did it only
| because labor had neglected to use their
political power in defense of their own
interest.
If the unions have been helpless before
monopoly it was because they clune to
outgrown methods and not because prog
ress is no longer possible. If unions have
been crushed by injunctions it is not be-
cause of lack of power to resist. but be-
cause union men have given their ballot
| to their enemies
! lnlonisrn can pass through this crisis
in one or two ways. It can fight on with
| present methods, dividing its strength,
/ industrially on the economic field ac-
cording to outgrown trade lines and di-
riding its vote politically among the par
| ties of capitalism until the present or
CARNATIONS are destroyed and new ones
are borne to meet the new conditions
Out union men can use their intelligence
TO change their methods and solidify their
forces W hile their organizations are still
strong.