Page:American Syndicalism (Brooks 1913).djvu/96

84 were discussed. The failure and futility of trade union policies got passionate emphasis. In the first form of the Preamble, the most rank offense is that "the trade unions aid the employing class to mislead the workers into the belief that the working class have interests in common with their employers." To avoid this partnership with the enemy, labor in an entire industry must be massed into one common group, no part of which can be pitted by employers against another. This is to be done in such way that all the "members in any one industry, or in all industries, if necessary, cease work whenever there is a strike or lockout in any department thereof, thus making an injury to one an injury to all."

It is to be carefully noted what this means. This all-inclusive union rests upon the assumption that their mass-interests are one and the same, as against the interests of the employing class. As we have seen, this illusion brought troubles thick and fast upon their forerunners, the Knights of Labor. It forced instant differences in this first assembly of the I. W. W. One of the more prominent members, still faithful, as a leading official writes of the Convention:

"All kinds and shades of theories and programs were represented among the delegates and individuals present at the first convention. The principal ones in evidence, however, were four: Parliamentary socialists—two types—impossibilist and opportunist; Marxian and reformist anarchists; industrial unionist; and the labor union fakir. The task of combining these conflicting elements was attempted by the convention."