The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-11-06
THE DANISH PLAN.

Denmark apparently has a judicial
establishment to handle labor disputes
similar to our court of industrial re-
lations. It is called a permanent
court of arbitration"
After settlement of the general
strike early in April. 1920, three labor
unions in Copenhagen, comprising the
seamen. the stokers and the long
shoremen, continued the strike in spite
of the settlement and altho their
agreements with the employers were
still valid.
The Association of Danish Employ
ers brought action against the labor
unions before the permanent court of
arbitration and contended for heavy
fines, emphasizing that the members
of the Association of Danish Steam
ship Owners had suffered great losses
thru the strike of the seamen's and
lstokers' unions-the losses being esti-
mated at 100000 kroner from March
81 to May land that the strike as
a whole was of an especially vicious
mature, partly because it was main
tanned during time when the country
having her money conditions strength
ened by the greatest possible export,
and partly because of great losses to
industries and trades as well as to ag-
riculture, thru their inability because
of the strike to fulfill their contracts.
The seamen's and stokers' union
contended for acquittal, or in the al
Tentative for as small fine as pos
sibLe, relying therefor partly on the
circumstances under which the strike
had been started, partly on the pecu-
liar difficulties which, they claimed,
had been presented to the seamen and
their fellow workers in going back to
work before a result had been arrived
at in the negotiations which the en-
ployers had offered to take up, after
the conclusion of the strike, in regard
to the conditions at which the strike
aimed.
The two unions asserted that they
had interpreted the call to join the
general strike as a guarantee for the
granting of certain demands, which.
however, had not been granted, and
further held, that the fact that the
unions had never formally been noti-
fled of the cancellation of the general
strike, as well as the fact that the AS
ISOLATION of Steamship Owners had
proceeded against the members of the
unions according to the 'desertion par
agraphs in the seamen's act, by hold
ing back their certificates of dis
charge, were to be considered as rea-
sons supporting the arguments of the
unions.
The court of arbitration found it I'M
necessary to go into the question of
the origin of the strike and into what
the unions had claimed in that con-
nection. The one fact, that the strike
had been maintained .Turing a period
in which the trade agreements were
valid made the strike illegal and the
unions could not escape responsibility.
Taking into consideration the fact
that the losses which the members of
the Association of Steamship Owners
had suffered during the protracted
strike could hardly be even estimated,
but at any rate were to be regarded as
very considerable, and considering
great annoyance to the population of
the entire country and had also struck
at the public's supply of foodstuffs
and other necessaries of life, the per-
manent court of arbitration found that
the Seamen's union should be fined
100000 kroner and the Stokers' union
100000 kroner.
In the suit brought against the
Longshoremen's union, the union
after first appealing to the court to
dismiss the case as bearing on a po-
litical controversial question regard
ing the general strike-contended for
acquittal, or in the alternative for the
payment of a small fine, as the strike,
If 1t were Illegal at all, could only be
so because the, rules for giving notice
had been neglected, and the strike
could therefore not have occasioned
greater losses than a strike for which
legal notice was given. The court saw
no reason for dismissing the case. and
considered it altogether unnecessary
to go into the contentious of the union
as to the relation of the strike to the
general strike
The court found that the union, in
consideration of the inestimabIe losses
which the strike had occasioned.
should pay a fine of SOC, 900 kroner.
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