Page:William Zebulon Foster - The Railroaders' Next Step, Amalgamation (1922).djvu/47

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When American railroad men embark upon the amalgamation of all their trade unions into one industrial union they will not be pioneers blazinga trail through an unknown wilderness. On the contrary, they will be setting forth on a well-travelled road, long since gone over by the railroad workers of France, Italy, England, Russia, Germany, Belgium, etc., on their way to freedom—for in all these countries all classes of railroad workers, save an occasional craft fragment here and there, are to be found in single organizations. In fact, the United States is the only important country in the world where the industrial form of union is not predominant among railroad workers. Here alone, where the need for solidarity is greater than anywhere else, is the antiquated craft type supreme—which does not speak well for our spirit of progress.

In considering measures to be taken by us for amalgamation we will do well to bear in mind the experiences of railroad workers of other countries. Great Britain, for instance, contains a lesson for us. In that country, it is true, the railroad organizations are not so completely industralized as they are in Continental Europe; but the general conditions of unionism are so similar to those here and the British unions have made so much progress towards industrial organization, that their achievements in this direction should prove valuable to us as a criterion.

The basic organization on British railroads is the National Union of Railwaymen (N. U. R.), which includes all classes of railroad workers. But it has not yet succeeded in completely industrializing the situation. The Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen, which