United Mine Workers of America

“ More specifically, the union abandoned its efforts to control the working time of the miners, agreed not to oppose the rapid mechanization of the mines which would substantially reduce mine employment, agreed to help finance such mechanization and agreed to impose the terms of the 1950 agreement on all operators without regard to their ability to pay. The benefit to the union was to be increased wages as productivity increased with mechanization, these increases to be demanded of the smaller companies whether mechanized or not. ”

“ Its representatives dealt tactfully with the racial hatreds, using the foreign language newspapers read by each group and also dealing with individual men in person, allaying suspicions, and showing each group what the success of the Allied and American armies would mean for its people in Europe. Officials of the United Mine Workers toured the mining regions, addressing the workers, informing the men on the questions involved in the war and urging them to do their best. ”

“ Despite allegations of conspiracy, which connotes clandestine activities, it is no secret that the United Mine Workers acting to further what it considers to be the best interests of its members, espouses a philosophy of achieving uniform high wages, fringe benefits, and good working conditions. As the quid pro quo for this, the Union is willing to accept the burdens and consequences of automation. ”

“ We are not trying the case of coal miners. We are not experts on coal mining. We do know that there are two great differences between the coal mining situation and the mining of iron ore in Jefferson County. In coal mining we find a union which has been strong and powerful and which as a union has been engaged in collective bargaining with the coal operators over a long period of years. In our case we find the efforts of the men to organize their union presents a pitiable picture of helplessness against the domination of the mining companies. In coal mining the men work seven hours per day. ”

“ If United Mine Workers' agreements are ineffective to make all of this time non-working time, how can they be effective to make half of it non-working time? Moreover, the averaging means that a part of the travel time earned by one miner is taken away from him and given to another who has earned less than the average, a procedure utterly unwarranted in the sta ute, if the statute applies at all. ”

“ We don't believe that a reduction in the mining rate will secure for you a larger amount of trade than you now have. We don't believe that the industry will be benefited by reducing wages. We know that in the past every reduction in wages has been given to the large consumers of coal-not to the domestic trade, not to those who can ill afford to pay high rates for coal, but to the railroad companies and the great manufacturers. We know that when the mining rate is lowest your profits have been least. ”

“ The 'face to face' method, whatever its other defects, is a method by which both operators and miners have tried to bring about uniformity of labor costs in the different unionized mines and to remove the operator's resistance to improved wage scales based on fear of competition. Under this decision there can be no uniform wage in this industry except by disregarding the very duty which this decision creates to pay each miner for his actual travel time. ”

“ In these conferences the operators frequently complained that the competition of many nonunion mines in Western Pennsylvania and the whole of West Virginia was ruinous to their business because of the low cost of production of coal in such mines, due to the lower wages and less expensive conditions of working than in union mines, and urged that something must be done to stop this, or that the union scale of wages be reduced. ”

“ In a joint conference between the union leaders and the coal operators, in 1904, Mr. Mitchell, the president of the union, spoke as follows:
'I believe the discussion of this matter should be carried on with perfect frankness and candor on both sides. I don't think we should disguise our position at all, and I want to state for our side of the house just where we are, as I understand it. We don't believe that a reduction in the mining rate will help you. We know that it will do us incalculable injury. ”

“ However, when the extension agreement expired on May 31, a second strike began. On June 3, President Roosevelt appealed to the miners to return to work, and they did so after the President of the Mine Workers ordered them to resume until June 20. On that day there was a third strike, which lasted three days, when it was terminated on appeal by President Roosevelt, the Union again directing the miners to resume work until October 31. ”

“ Thus the companies agreed not to lease coal lands to nonunion operators, and in 1958 agreed not to sell or buy coal from such companies. The companies and the union jointly and successfully approached the Secretary of Labor to obtain establishment under the Walsh-Healey Act, as amended, 49 Stat. 2036, 41 U.S.C. § 35 et seq. (1958 ed) , of a minimum wage for employees of contractors selling coal to the TVA, such minimum wage being much higher than in other industries and making it difficult for small companies to compete in the TVA term contract market. ”

“ Overproduction and savage, competitive warfare wasted the industry. Labor and capital alike were the victims. Financial distress among operators and acute poverty among miners prevailed even during periods of general prosperity. This history of the bituminous coal industry is written in blood as well as in ink. ”

“ Thus, two men working shoulder to shoulder, but entering the mine at different portals must receive either different amounts of pay in their envelopes or must stay at their productive work a different length of time. Thus, too, old mines which have burrowed far from their portals must shoulder greatly increased labor cost per ton. ”

“ The United States was granted power to seize and operate defense plants whose production was hampered by labor disputes. Specific remedies were formulated by Congress against interference with the Government's operation. ”

“ We think there was substantial evidence at the second trial in this case tending to show that the purpose of the destruction of the mines was to stop the production of nonunion coal and prevent its shipment to markets of other states than Arkansas, where it would by competition tend to reduce the price of the commodity and affect injuriously the maintenance of wages for union labor in competing mines, and that the direction by the District Judge to return a verdict for the defendants other than the International Union was erroneous. ”

“ The whole country is full of coal mines. The annual coal-producing capacity of Arkansas is about 2,000,000 tons. The product is a smokeless coal, like the Pocohontas of West Virginia. All the Arkansas mines, but one small one, were union. The towns in the neighborhood, Hartford, Huntington, Midland, Frogtown, and others, were peopled by union miners, and the business done in them was dependent on union miners' patronage. Hartford, a town of 2,500, was about 3 miles from Prairie Creek ”

“ Stewart, the president, caned attention to a new field in Oklahoma which he said would be a great competitor of union coal fields, and that District No. 21 would be forced to call a strike to bring in to line certain operators in that section, and in the event that they did so the District would fight such a conflict to the bitter end regardless of cost. They also discussed a proposal to reduce the scale at the union mines at McCurtain, Okl., which Stewart advocated, in order that the McCurtain operators might be put on a proper competitive basis in interstate markets with other operators. ”

“ The United Mine workers makes its boast that when a contract is signed with it by a mine, anyone, whether union man or independent, can get work; yet it at once becomes a grievance, and the miner is forced to quit if he don't join the union. ”

“ The public was aroused by many rumors of huge war chests being maintained by labor unions, of enormous fees and dues being extorted from war workers, of political contributions to parties and candidates which later were held as clubs over the head of high Federal officials.
'* * * The source of much of the national trouble today in the coal strike situation is that ill-advised political contribution of another day (referring, apparently, to the reported contribution of over $400,000 by the United Mine Workers in the 1936 Campaign, see S.Rep.No. 151, 75th Cong., 1st Sess.) . ”

“ If the I. W. W. was in the coal industry, the tonnage (piece-work) system of mining would not be in vogue. The miners would be spared all the inconveniences and controversy growing out of that operators' scheme. Miners would work by the day. There would be no check-off, for the miner would have his wages without bothering about dockage, short weight, minimum turn, or what not. There would be no danger of "sell outs" in negotiations, or forced arbitration, for a united working class would secure justice for the miners, and could depend upon the miners in their turn. ”

“ The possible total to which their production might be brought was testified to by a number of new expert witnesses who were familiar with the mines and the business of mining and selling coal in the markets of the neighboring states. The conclusion of some of these witnesses was that with the union restrictions removed and a regular demand for the coal, the capacity of all the mines, owned and leased by the plaintiffs, those destroyed and those uninjured, could have been increased to substantially more than 5,000 tons a day. ”

“ What really is shown by the evidence in the case at bar, drawn from discussions and resolutions of conventions and conference, is the stimulation of union leaders to press their unionization of nonunion mines, not only as a direct means of bettering the conditions and wages of their workers, but also as a means of lessening interstate competition for union operators, which in turn would lessen the pressure of those operators for reduction of the union scale or their resistance to an increase. ”

“ It is argued that this agreement constituted an agreement by United Mine Workers to impose the wage scale on all nonsignatory coal operators in order to force some (including petitioners) out of business. ”

“ In our previous opinion we held that a trades union, organized as effectively as this United Mine Workers' organization was, might be held liable, and all its funds raised for the purpose of strikes might be levied upon to pay damages suffered through illegal methods in carrying them on ”

“ To avoid the charge of a breach of the union scale, he had a contract made between the Mammoth Vein Coal Mining Company, which he controlled, and the Prairie Creek Coal Company and the Mammoth Vein Coal Company, by which the Mammoth Vein Coal Mining Company, a corporation with $100 capital, agreed to run the mines. ”

“ The workings of the joint machinery creaked and faltered under the impact of strikes and lockouts due in the main to market fluctuations, and for a decade the United Mine Workers, in spite of periods of prosperity and rapid growth, was perpetually threatened with the fate of its predecessors. ”

“ More mines were in operation and more coal was hoisted in the Wyoming valley today than any day since the stationary fireman’s strike began. Despite any action that may be taken by the officers of the United Mine Workers’ association, the fact cannot be denied but that the United Workmen as a body are anxious to get back to work. How long they can be kept out by the executive heads is entirely problematical. ”

“ The guards, directed not to use their guns save to defend their own lives, were at the mercy of the union miners, who assaulted them, took their guns away, and injured a number of them. The employees deserted the mine which filled with water upon the stopping of the pumps. One of the crowd went up to the top of the coal tipple and planted a flag on which was the legend, 'This is a union man's country.' Mr. Bache obtained from the federal District Court an injunction against the union miners and others taking part in this lawless violence, including among them the president of No. ”

“ Often I have helped lay out for burial the babies of the miners, and the mothers could scarce conceal their relief at the little ones’ deaths. Another was already on its way, destined, if a boy, for the breakers; if a girl, for the silk mills where the other brothers and sisters already worked.
The United Mine Workers decided to organize these fields and work for human conditions for human beings. Organizers were put to work. Whenever the spirit of the men in the mines grew strong enough a strike was called. ”

“ There must be mine bosses, mine inspectors, mine superintendents, [231] and many of them, and they are, as a rule, promoted from the ranks. Young men of character, skill, and judgment are almost sure to step into the higher places.
If it were not for two evils that constantly menace and hamper him, the coal miner of to-day would be the most favored of workmen. These twin evils are strikes and lockouts. Abolish them and there would be no more comfortable, happy, and generally prosperous class of people in America than the workers in the coal mines. ”