The Connecticut labor press., 1920-11-27
LABOR DESIRES
 PEACE AS MUCH
 AS DOES ANYBODY
Deplores Strikes and Industrial Disputes and Would Gladly
 Find a Better Way.
ARE FORCED TO FIGHT
Cant Be Expected to Relinquish Only Safeguard Against
 Spoilation. 4


 An entire editorial page of Golfers Weekly, in a recent issue, IS devoted to an argument based upon this ex- pression of trade-union officials:
 Every strike has; been settled by men sitting around a table. Why not make this settlement before the strike begins ?"
 This proposition. as well as all the other schemes suggested and presented from time to time for the adjustment of industrial disputes or the maintain ing of industrial peace, drive the thoughts of the trade unionist who has had years of experience back into the past, and not very distant past either, covering only about 25 years. Then labor was weak, organizations few and membership in them limited and very secret. Men were afraid to let not only employers know that they were trade unionistS, but the fact must be hidden even from their neighbors and many of their fellow-workers, because 1t was not a popular position to occupy. The argu- meT1t was frequently heard III those days, even by well-intentiered gentle men, that labor organizations were in stitutious that constantly created trou- ble and discord and that the workers would be much better off living in peace and harmony with their employ- CTS. The means, by which the peace and harmony they. talked about was maintained never entered the minds of the peace lovers. The idea that the employer had been absolute master of the situation and the employe an obcdi- .ent slave never occurred to chem.
 There never can be- fight SC long as one man is master and the other a slave, and that was the basis of indus trial peace in the, years zone by. Now that labor has become intelligent enough to appreciate the efficacy of organiza- tion, and has built mp powerful unions of the toilers in' the industrial world, employers and the public generally are wiling to admit that there are two sides to the industrial problem and that the worker is entitled t0 a voice m the fixing Of wages and conditions of em- plOyfnent. But we must not lose sight of the fact that this change in affairs is not due to any disposition on the part of the employer to be n'ore fair and reasonable than in the past It IS not the result Sof a charitable or merciful dispositioH on the part of the captains of Industry. It is due solely and en- tirely to the fact that the workers have SO perfected their organizations that they are in a position to enforce their demands or severely punish the enl-' p1oyer who fails to treat fairly with them Were the workers without their anxiety on the part of either the er1l- ployer or the public for the discovery of some means of maintaining indus trial peace. Necessity, not desire to do justice prompts them in their search. Tn ffs fI1RS 4a1IfE ing facts 1t Is not the intention to per suade the workers that industrial peace is not desirable, but rather to point to the absolute necessity Ot maintaining organizations powerful enough to com rnand the serious attention and the re- specf of everybody. The workers know that strikes are expensive, that they. bring great hardships at times upon the toilers and their families, and that a better, saner means of adjusting diff ference ought to be discovered by in te11igent men. There can be no ques- ton about the workers being in full possession of this knowledge, and that they are as anxious as the employer or the public to find some other way out but no reasonable human being will ex- pect them, because of their desire for peace, to throw away, or allow others to take away from them, the great in Strument winch has enaDied them 70 climb to the position of influence they occupy today and stand hopelessly helpless before the rninions of greed. Such course would be sheer insan- ity, and no one who has the interest of humanity as a whole at heart or who deserves to be catalogued in the list of wise co1lnselors would advocate such procedure It must, therefore, be un derstood that while the organized workers are willing to do everything within reason to bring about peace and concord in the industrial world, they can not consent to the reiinquishing. of the right to strike, because without that right they would be at the mercy of those who are not willing to deal fairly with them.
 If some plan can be evoked for bringing employer and employe togeth- er in conference so that differences can be adjusted upon the basis of reason and justice, 1t will find hearty vel come on the part of organized labor, but it must be in fact just arrange ment and not sham affair, calculated to benefit either the employer or the public to the uni ust detriment of the