The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1920-07-16
TIMBERWORKERS'
TENSE CAMPAIGN
OF ORGANIZING

General Organizer Harry Call of
the international Union Of Timber
Workers, arrived in the city last
Sunday to work with Organizer
Harry Wood, of Everett, in organic
ing the timber workers of Everett
and vicinity. In an interview with
representative of the Journal, Or
ganizer Call said in part:
1--WE propose to organize all OF
the men in the timber industry in
the city of Everett and surrounding
country. There is an insistent de-
mand for organization now. Some
Northwest lumber operators have
already attempted to return to the
ten hour day. Some of them open
ly, others through subterfuge. Re-
auctions in wages are rumored, bonus
and contract plans are being put up
to the men. They resent these
proposals.
Regardless of how the operators in
the city of Everett may feel toward
return to the long work day, once
the movement to return to it is
launched, they have the alternative
of either joining in the movement
or the hopeless possibility of long
continuing on an eight-hour basis
with other plants that may operate
ten hours or more per day.
Today scores of mills and camps
are closed and they say they are
trying to stabilize the market. While
mills and camps are closed, men are
idle. While the employers are on
strike against the present prices of
lumber there is no immediate pros
pect Of increases in wages; there is
no guarantee that the men will share
in any increase in prices"
In speaking of the Loyal Legion
of Loggers' and Lumbermen, Or
ganizer Call said:
when the Board of Directors of
the Loyal Legion last January de-
clared for the open or more prop
erly named 'non-union' shop, they
betrayed every man and woman en-
ployed in the timber industry, they
tried to cruelty them with nails
wrought by the. employers. But that
was part of what the policy of the
Loyal Legion has always been, to
play into the hands of the lumber
operators. That is what they re-
tanned it as a peace time organiza-
ton for.
"The Loyal Legion was born in
corruption, under the guidance of
military martinez, and fostered by
those who believed in autocratic
methods in industry. 1t is the
sole survivor of the malodorous
| Disque regime. While it is true
that some minor amendments have
been made to its constitution, funda-
mentally it is the same as the war
time Loyal Legion and is just as
fundamentally wrong. If there was
even shadow of possibility that it
would function in the interest of the
workers, and there is none, the en-
ployers would fight it. Its record
floats to the skies, it covers every-
thing in the scale of treachery to
the workers, from scabbing on ex-
soldiers to its notorious open shop
declaration of last January.
"The West Coast Lumberman. an
employers publication, in a quite re-
cent issue, boasts of the fact that
the members Of the Loyal Legion
have acted as strike breakers, only
as they put it men who refused to
walk out, distinction without a
difference. 1t boasts that LOYAL
Legion men are organized in suffi-
clent numbers to prevent a general
walk out. That one thing should be
enough to show men from what di-
rection the wind is blowing. In
many places the men have abandoned
the Loyal Legion; they have revolted
against its domination; they have
refused to longer lie in the same
bed with the Associated Industries
and other union-busting organiza-
tions.
Now that organizers of the Tim
Der Workers are in the city of Ev-
erett, we shall expect the LOYAL Lee
gion to run true to form and seek
to carry out the employers wishes
in trying to prevent the organiza-
ton Of a real union in the timber
industry here. OF the outcome we
are quite confident, not that we so
hlgnly estimate our ability as or
ganizers, but because the men them
selves want a substantial organiza-
ton. We are here to give it to
them.
Inc Loyal Legion organizers have
no constructive arguments. Recently
l met one of them in debate in the
city of Bend, Oregon. He was de-
cisively defeated as evidenced by the
applause given me by the crowd of
over one thousand people in attend
ance. | issued a standing chal-
lenge to any of their officers, or
ganlzers or members to meet me
in debate anywhere at any time.
"They have failed to deliver the
goods for the workers in the past:
they are not doing it today, and
will not in the future.
The real hope for the workers in
the timber industry is membership
IN the International Union of Tim
berworkers, the only bona-fide labor
organization in that industry. 1t is
On raaaYpizaI a., A.