The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1917-09-28
HOW THEY DID 1T
In KANSAS CITY
By William p. Harvey.

found contrast to conditions in Bis
bee, Ariz., was the settlement of the
street car strike in Kansas City.
In Bisbee, the strikers were de-
ported. In Kansas City, for the
first time in the history of economic
movements in America, as far as
large industrial centers were con-
cerned, citizens en- masse deported
the strikebreakers. And to make
the contrast all the more striking,
the union men defended the strike
breakers from the anger of the
thousands of citizens who broke out
doors and windows of the car barn
where the strikebreakers were
housed.
Forming rings about the strike
breakers by holding hand to hand,
striking street car men and volun-
teers from other unions, guarded the
strikebreakers. The line of march
to the Union Station was by way
of the principal streets of the city.
Hundreds of thousands of men and
women ragged against the thin lines
of the union men. Curses and jeers
were hurled at the strikebreakers
continuously. Covering in fear and
with their hands held high above
their heads in the march of several
miles, the strikebreakers, abject and
beaten, shrank close to the men
whose jobs they were to take, seek
ing protection.
The street car strike also present.
ed wildly another unusual phase of
the present economic movement. The
strikers, as were most strikers in
recent years, were not members of
union. They were driven to re-
volt by intolerable conditions of la
Dor and from being forced to live
below the bread and butter line. 1t
was only after the strike had been on
twenty-four hours that formal eff
fort to unionize was begun. For
eight days not street car travelled
over Kansas City's streets.
Strange to relate, the settlement
was brought about by the activity of
business men, many of them employ
ers of thousands of men and women.
THE NEWSPAPERS TOLD THE
TRUTH ABOUT THE STRIKE
AND THE WAGES AND HOURS
OF THE FORMER STREET CAR
EMPLOYEES.
The truth would win any strike,
even as it did this one. Club wo-
men, local publicists, professional
men and business men were shocked
at the intolerable burden the men
had been sustaining for years. The
merchants saw in such low-paid labor
a city liability rather than an as
set. For eight days the citizens
walked to and from their work, or
rode in jitneys and other vehicles.
Thousands pinched themselves to
meet the added costs of this method
of riding. But for the entire eight
days, the city as a whole sustained
and encouraged the strikers.
The settlement was made on the
basis of the first proposal of the
strikers. They now have a union.
with more than IS per cent of the
men enrolled. Magnus Sinclair, gen.
eral organizer for the national street
car union, directed the negotiations.
The settlement is due to him, through
his courage and his pose, as we'll as
his judicial advice, as much as to any
other contributing cause.
Kansas City gained more than
victory of street car men merely.
1t gained new civic conscience: a
wider social vision; newer COM
prehension of the vileness of corpora
ton heads who drain the slums and
backwaters of great cities for the
creatures they arm for use in break
ing strikes. No corporation here
after may dare to impose thugs and
pluguglies on this community to aid
IN holding thousands of citizens of
the town in industrial thrall. Kan
sas City emerged from an uncom-
pretending city to a community in
winch economic betterments have OBJ
tanned a newer and more desirable
value.