Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-10-22
LABOR IN ENGLAND
Leaders, Engaged in Politics,
Fail in Directing Contests.
UNIONS ARE ALL AT SEA
Exchanges Favor Employers, De-
clare Critics.
HELP TO BRING DOWN WAGES
Press Asks That System Be Given
Chance to Work Itself Out
Before Condemned.
HELP TO BRING DOWN WAGES
Foreign Correspondence OF The Star.

Foreign Correspondence OF The Star.
LONDON, October s, 1910.
Labor is cutting a large figure ir
the affairs Of England at present.
The Times says that the most re-
markable thing about the present in
dustrial turmoil is not the number
extent and variety Of the dispute GO
ing on, but the bewildering sudden
ness with which they arise and dis
perse. 1t is difficult to follow the
movement from day to day, it shifts 50
rapidly, and impossible to remember
all its phases.
Thousands Of men leave work Mon
day and come back Tuesday or We'd
nesday, or next week. One day they
will not approach the employers; the
next they are quite friendly. and they
treat their officials in the same way,
now defying them and now submis-
sively following their lead.
The latest of these kaleidoscope
turns is the action of the South Wales
miners employed by the "Cambrian
coal combine" \ week or two ago
they were attacking their own leaders
and some Of them insisted on striking,
but changed their minds within a few
hours.
Since then they have been simmerins
with suppressed excitement, which has
carried them backward and forward,
first in one direction and then in the
other, until it is impossible to say
what their position is.
Leaders Not Leading.
The men have no plan because they
have nobody to make one. That USED
to be the function of their leaders,
who were trusted accordingly; they
attended to the business of the union,
and gave the men a lead in peace or
war. Now they are too much immersed
in politics to attend to the affairs of
the union.
how to advise their members, who &C
cordingly pay no attention to them. 1t
is one of the results of the modern
political activity of the unions.
Reviewing the result of the forty-third
Trade Union Congress at Sheffield, the
Standard correspondent says: 1T
has been the fashion in many quarters to
call the congress the Parliament of
Labor; l should say that much more
appropriate name would be the Caucus
OF Labor Bureaucrats.
Practically every delegate belonged or
aspireS to belong to the official and sala-
ried class by which trade unions are
managed and by which. to great ex-
u,
ed. Jealousies and rivalries exist which
often brought delegates into sharp per-
sonal conflict, but when the common in
terests of the bureaucracy were at stake
it was wonderful how completely they
were united.
In regard to some Of the most impor-
tant matters connected with trade union
ism there was nothing that might be
called an opposition" party in the con-
gress: there was nobody there to direct
the light of independent criticism on Off
cial action because the vast army COM
posed of ordinary members of the unions,
who are known to be in active or passive
disagreement with their leaders policy
on important points. does not seem to
have obtained and representation.
In order to get adequate idea of
what the Trade Union Congress was like
it is necessary TO imagine an imperial par
Lament composed entirely OF permanent
officials. 1t is not at all likely
that such a parliament would criticise
the work and the methods of its own
members, or initiate debates which might
expose weaknesses or abuses In the ad-
miniSt rative systems or governmental
policies for which they were responsible:
and because trade union officials are only
mortal they do not allow awkward sub