The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1934-05-28
MONDAY, MAY %, 1894.
THE STRIKE NOBODY WON


ONE hears good deal of discussion over
Owho really won the Real Silk strike.
Frankly we don't know. The settlement by
The national labor board did not go to the
fundamental issues of the dispute. 1t merely
postponed decision by finding that the election
at the mill would stand until October.
Common sense is all that is needed to see
that if the election was fair and binding It's
results should stand for the duration of the
MIRA. If on the other hand, the vote was
unfair and unjust it should not be allowed
to stand for a single day.
The management of Real Silk has stub
bornly maintained that it never would
recognize" the Full Fashioned Hosiery
Workers Union Yet it did sign the joint
I9ttlement with this union, thus recognizing
me organizations right to negotiate for the
employees in this single instance. That was
sop to the strikers.
Striking union members claimed the right
fully and permanently to represent the
knitters The national labor board did not
grant this. but merely deferred further dis
cussion for five months.
< The decision was distinctly aabby one.
Members of the board should have had the
courage either to stand by Real Silk manage
ment or by the strikers
It did serve the useful purpose of termi-
mating a strike which was showing signs of
becoming dangerously like the industrial war
fare in Minneapolis and Toledo. For this the
community may be thankful.
There is some reason to believe that the
administration is anxious to keep the labor
clauses of the national industrial recovery act
out of court Perhaps that is why the labor
board temporized with Real Silk.
While we can not tell you who won" the
strike we do know who lost it.
The stockholders of Real Silk were distinct
losers because of the curtailment of produc-
ton at the busy season and because of the
evil publicity the strike brought to their
product throughout the ranks of organized
labor in the nation.
The strikers lost because the wages they
might have earned while they were out are
now gone forever.
Indianapolis lost because a big pay roll
temporarily disappeared from the gross pur-
chasing power of the city and because one of
its big industries was crippled.
Strikes are like fire without insurance
purely destructive. AS in a confagration they
lave a tendency to Spread. Usually they are
Larted and. kept going by few stubborn
ywillful or ignorant men, who are as dangerous
as pyromaniacs.
These incendiaries may be on the side of
either capital or labor. In the case of Real
Silk we believe that the fault lay with the
stiff -necked and arrogant attitude of the mills
management
The strikers were ready and willing to nego-
tate settlement from the instant the
knitters walked out. The management merely
parroted: I'VE won't deal with any outside
union
The strikes in Toledo and Minneapolis
show the stupid and dangerous lengths to
which industrial, warfare may go. Indianap-
oils wants no tragic performances of that
type.
After ALL labor and capital both have equal
stakes in the welfare of the community
Patience and tolerance on both sides can iron
out their differences.
Indianapolis is justly proud of the fact that
its population is IS per cent native born
American. Let us try, in the future, to settle
our industrial grievances like real Americans
around conference table instead of by
aboTtive strikes in which every one loses.
Such procedure would be the best possible
thing for the city and would show the rest of
the nation that at least one community knows
how to use common sense in these trying
times of shift and change