Page:George Henry Soule - Recent Developments in Trade Unionism (1921).pdf/8

 The recent organization of the white-collar worker also assists the growth of industrial unionism, because it adds to the ranks of labor certain highly necessary persons who maintain the offices of the employer. If these persons remain at work during a strike, it is easier for the employer to keep his business going and to start it up again by the use of strike-breakers.

Another factor in the growth of industrial unionism has been the necessity of acting together on the part of established craft unions themselves. If in a certain metal factory there are machinists, iron moulders, toolmakers, metal polishers, and numerous other crafts, each organized in a separate union, it is folly for the machinists to go on strike alone for their demands, and for all the other crafts to keep at work. This is true because, in the first place, it is easier for the employer to defeat the machinists acting alone, and in the second place, if they win, the moulders are likely to go on strike the next month for their own demands, and so on, so that the work of the factory is disorganized for a longer period, and everybody suffers. Of course this lesson has been learned in the clothing industry, where all the workers in a factory co-operate in struggles against the employer. But if you imagine the cutters, the operators, and each of the other crafts organized in separate unions and striking at different times, with no joint board to govern their activities, you will imagine