Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1919-11-06
Summons Of Workers Organi-
za'ion Obeyed BY Men In
Twenty-Eisht States
FEDERAL INJUNCTION ISSUED.
Union Heads Protest Governments
Action-Uncle Sam Moves to Pro-
tect Interests Of the People
In Grave Crisis.

Washington, D. C.-Bituminous coal
miners in twenty-eight states of the
union laid down their tools and quit
work last Saturday in obeyance to a
strike call issued by convention Of
the United Mine Workers of. America
at Cleveland, Ohio, September %.
The first alarm of the strike, which
IS expected to cause, a general paraly-
sis of the business of the nation and
untold suffering if not brought to q
speedy conclusion, was given at the
Cleveland meeting when the declara-
ton was made that the war time wage
agreement, entered into between the
government and the miners, would end
November /.
Executive officers charged with the.
duty of negotiating new agreement
were ordered to stand out for three
demands, and II not granted, to issue
strike call for more than 400 900 soft
coal miners in % states. These de-
mands We're
A fiye-day working week, a six-hour
day and a wage increase of 60 per cent.
At scale committee meetings in Buff
falO and Philadelphia miners and OPP
orators threshed over their differences
without settlement. Representatives
of the miners contended that the de-
mands We're not arbitrary, that the GO
per cent wage increase was set as
basis for negotiation, that six-hour
day meant actual time the miners
<rN,fr n
Insist on Short Day.
I The miners insisted on a .fve-day.
week, they said, because there were
not four days work a week the year
around for each miner They contend.
ed by limiting each miner to five days
there would be more equitable distri-
button of the work The leaders de-
MED, that it was the beginning of ma
tionwide campaign for a shorter work
Ing schedule.
After failure of the two sides to get
together the strike order was issued
by direction of the presidents cabinet,
Immediately called into conference the
heads of the mining and operating as
sociations. Subsequently the full scale
committees of each We're called in and
various proposals were offered and re-
jected.
Put Up to Wilson.
The final proposal was made by
President Wilson. 1t suggested nego-
tiation without reservation, submission
of questions still. in dispute with the
failure of negotiation to arbitration.
and continued operation of the mines
pending final settlement.
The operators, as set forth in n state
ment BY Secretary Wilson, accepted
the offer in its entirety; the miners ac-t
cepted the offer of negotiation and
held the other two for consideration
later" This, as explained by Secre-
tary Wilson, abruptly ended the con-
ference.
The miners in the series of confer
erces charged that while the wartime
agreement still bound them. to work
at the old wartime wage scale, it re-
moved restrictions on the war price of
coal and permitted operators to charge
what they pleased. This, they declar-
ed, had led to profiteering.
An appeal to the miners by Presi-
dent Wilson and announcement by At
torney General Palmer that the strike
would be considered illegal" failed
to bring about the resembling Of the
strike order.
On the eve of the strike. Judge A. b.
Anderson of the federal court at In
dianapolis, Ind, issued a restraining
order to stop officials of the Mine
Workers union from engineering the
strike.
The principal leaders in the miners
NoN-PARTisAN AGENT SUES.