The unions representing the different trades vary in structure and spirit.There is an immense difference between the temper of the tumultuous structural iron workers and the contemplative cigar-makers, who often hire one of their number to read to them while engaged in their work, the favorite authors being in many instances Ruskin and Carlyle.Some unions are more successful than others in collective bargaining.Martin Fox, the able leader of the iron moulders, signed one of the first trade agreements in America and fixed the tradition for his union; and the shoemakers, as well as most of the older unions are fairly well accustomed to collective bargaining.In matters of discipline, too, the unions vary.Printers and certain of the more skilled trades find it easier to enforce their regulations than do the longshoremen and unions composed of casual foreign laborers.In size also the unions of the different trades vary.In 1910 three had a membership of over 100,000 each.Of these the United Mine Workers reached a total of 370,800, probably the largest trades union in the world.The majority of the unions have a membership between 1000 and 10,000, the average for the entire number being 5000; but the membership fluctuates from year to year, according to the conditions of labor, and is usually larger in seasons of contest.Fluctuation in membership is most evident in the newer unions and in the unskilled trades.The various unions differ also in resources.In some, especially those composed largely of foreigners, the treasury is chronically empty; yet at the other extreme the mine workers distributed $1,890,000 in strike benefits in 1902 and had $750,000 left when the board of arbitration sent the workers back into the mines.
The efforts of the unions to adjust themselves to the quickly changing conditions of modern industries are not always successful.Old trade lines are instantly shifting, creating the most perplexing problem of inter-union amity.Over two score jurisdictional controversies appear for settlement at each annual convention of the American Federation.The Association of Longshoremen and the Seamen's Union, for example, both claim jurisdiction over employees in marine warehouses.The cigar-makers and the stogie-makers have also long been at swords'
points.Who shall have control over the coopers who work in breweries--the Brewery Workers or the Coopers' Union? Who shall adjust the machinery in elevators--the Machinists or Elevator Constructors? Is the operator of a linotype machine a typesetter?
So plasterers and carpenters, blacksmiths and structural iron workers, printing pressmen and plate engravers, hod carriers and cement workers, are at loggerheads; the electrification of a railway creates a jurisdictional problem between the electrical railway employees and the locomotive engineers; and the marble workers and the plasterers quarrel as to the setting of imitation marble.These quarrels regarding the claims of rival unions reveal the weakness of the Federation as an arbitral body.There is no centralized authority to impose a standard or principle which could lead to the settlement of such disputes.Trade jealousy has overcome the suggestions of the peacemakers that either the nature of the tools used, or the nature of the operation, or the character of the establishment be taken as the basis of settlement.
When the Federation itself fails as a peacemaker, it cannot be expected that locals will escape these controversies.There are many examples, often ludicrous, of petty jealousies and trade rivalries.The man who tried to build a brick house, employing union bricklayers to lay the brick and union painters to paint the brick walls, found to his loss that such painting was considered a bricklayer's job by the bricklayers' union, who charged a higher wage than the painters would have done.It would have relieved him to have the two unions amalgamate.And this in general has become a real way out of the difficulty.For instance, a dispute between the Steam and Hot Water Fitters and the Plumbers was settled by an amalgamation called the United Association of Journeymen Plumbers, Gas Fitters, Steam Fitters, and Steam Fitters' Helpers, which is now affiliated with the Federation.But the International Association of Steam, Hot Water, and Power Pipe Fitters and Helpers is not affiliated, and interunion war results.The older unions, however, have a stabilizing influence upon the newer, and a genuine conservatism such as characterizes the British unions is becoming more apparent as age solidifies custom and lends respect to by-laws and constitutions.But even time cannot obviate the seismic effects of new inventions, and shifts in jurisdictional matters are always imminent.The dominant policy of the trade union is to keep its feet on the earth, no matter where its head may be; to take one step at a time, and not to trouble about the future of society.This purpose, which has from the first been the prompter of union activity, was clearly enunciated in the testimony of Adolph Strasser, a converted socialist, one of the leading trade unionists, and president of the Cigar-makers' Union, before a Senate Committee in 1883:
Chairman: You are seeking to improve home matters first?
Witness: Yes sir, I look first to the trade I represent: I look first to cigars, to the interests of men, who employ me to represent their interests.
Chairman: I was only asking you in regard to your ultimate ends.
Witness: We have no ultimate ends.We are going on from day to day.We are fighting only for immediate objects, objects that can be realized in a few years.
Chairman: You want something better to eat and to wear, and better houses to live in?
Witness: Yes, we want to dress better and to live better, and become better citizens generally.
