O. June 27, 1905, just a week before the annual celebration of the Fourth of July, William D. Haywood called to order the Industrial Union convention in -Brand’s Hall, Chicago:

This is the Continental Congress of the working class. We are here to confederate the workers of this country into a working class movement that shall have for its purpose the emancipation of the working class from the slave bondage of capitalism.

The observance of the United States’ Declaration of Independence from Eng- land must have been in Haywood’s mind when he spoke these words. Just as the Continental Congress had been the orga- .nizational force which, from 1775 to 1789, guided the revolutionaries in their ef- forts to establish the new republic, so the Industrial Workers of the World was

rotest Meeting

proclaimed in Chicago to be the organiz- ed mechanism to liberate the working people and to raise the earth ‘‘on new foundations.”’

The three outstanding figures at the founding convention were William D. (Big Bill) Haywood, a founder of the Western Federation of Miners; Daniel De Leon, the dogmatic leader of the Social- ist Labor Party; and Eugene Victor Debs, eloquent spokesman of the Socialist Party of America who had polled 420,000 votes as presidential-candidate in 1904.

Also attending was Mary Jones, better ©

known as “Mother” Jones, the beloved organizer of the coal miners. Lucy Par- sons, the widow of one of the Haymarket martyrs of 1886, was also among those present. She took the floor to urge that the convention ‘take example’”’ from the men and women who were at that mo- ment fighting the Czar in the Russian Revolution of 1905.

The Industrial Workers of the World— better known by the initials IWW than by its full name—did not fulfill the grandiose role it set for itself. Indeed, its active history did not comprise more than a dozen or fifteen years out of the 200-year span of US. history. (This is said despite the fact that vestigial remains of the TWW exist to this very day.) Certainly by 1920 the organization had ceased to be an effective entity. Its own inherent weaknesses compounded the effects of vicious persecution by the government— the penalty for having resolutely opposed

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—JULY 2, 1976—Page 6 _

U.S. participation in the imperialist First World War. Almost from its inception the IWW was subjected to unscrupulous persecution by state and federal govern- ments. During its relatively brief life the organization was a constant irritant to United States capitalism.

As the IWW was being banished from the active labor scene, the Communist Party was coming into being (September 1919) to begin its enduring struggle. for the ultimate objectives the IWW had se for itself. ;

The founders of the IWW were prompt- ed by their quest for a labor movement which would be distinguished from the established American Federation of Labor by its industrial union form and from the Socialist parties by its syndicalist goal. While the IWW accepted members from workingclass parties—and was founded with the participation of leaders from

1

both the Socialist Party of America and the Socialist Labor Party—it had no be- lief in party politics, parliamentary action or legislative programs.

Its only political objective was the seizure of power, and this was to be accomplished by workers organized in one big industrial union: they would de- clare a general strike, lock -out the capitalists until they capitulated, take over the means of production and pro- ceed to guide society without the need for the repressive features of the state. This philosophy, and its variants, is generally known .as anarcho-syndicalism.

If this long range program had been all there was to IWW practice, it is doubtful that it would have lasted even the few years it did—and it certainly would not have made the important and lasting contribution to the U.S. labor

"by fire-hoses in mid-winter; ay

which ensued. The strike reversey attempted wage cut into a wage ines A working force consisting principa) immigrants, speaking almost four different dialects, was converted jj

frameup; their picketlines were d

dynamite plot was exposed as the | of a boss’ agent; one of their ny was killed by gunfire,—and it tog months to free two of their leaders were charged with being - accessor) her murder. Hundreds of hungry chi of the Lawrence strikers were © foster care in New York, Philade Barre, Vt., in a humanitarian 4 which captured international attention

By Arthur Simson

movement with which it can justly be credited. But the IWW contributed to our heritage in a number of ways: it advocat- ed industrial unionism when the AFL was clinging to craft unionism; it. was open to Black workers, to the foreign- born, to women, to the unskilled—cate- gories which most AFL unions ignored or rejected; it was repelled by the capitula- tory opportunism of the AFL leadership; it conducted many hard-fought strike struggles and struggles for freedom of speech. The IWW, whose members were called Wobblies, developed innovative methods of struggle, including sit-in strikes, and its picketlines and meetings were enlivened by song. (Many of its songs were written by its doomed poet, Joe Hill.)

Perhaps the finest example of the IWW in action was its masterly conduct of the strike of textile workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts, which lasted for more than nine weeks, from January into March, during the bitter New England winter of 1912.

State law had reduced the legal hours of work for women and children from 56 per week to 54, effective January 1. The mill owners reduced the hours of the male workers as well. At the-first January payday, the workers discovered that their measly pay, ranging basically from 8 cents to 12 cents an _ hour, had been cut to reflect the shorter work week.

The IWW gave guidance to the strike

Top: A leaflet to announce a meeting protesting the impending execution of Joe Hill.

Center: Mother Jones leading a march of mill children, 1903. Bottom: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn and Big Bill Haywood.

by its principled anti-capitalism and mj

The strike was won; wage incre, of from 5-20% were granted. And 1 new members were in Local 20, IVW. _

The leftist philosophy of the IWW not congenial to the basically conses tive religious inclination of the Lawred workers. With the great struggle the IWW’s flaunting of the slogan 4 God, No Master’ made it vulnerg By the summer of 1913, Local 20 down to 700 members.

In addition to its underestimation political action, the IWW had the ng tive effect of drawing off militants f the mainstream—principally the AR} and rendering them relatively ineffect, Lenin’s later admonition against s) sectarianism drew to the Commu} Party men ‘like William Z. Foster, yp had been a Wobbly for a brief peri and even Big Bill Haywood, who. rem ed the leader of the IWW from its foul ing to its essential end.

Many of the outstanding figures of § twentieth century labor movement—n like Foster, women like Elizabeth Gur} Flynn—were associated, some only brij ly, with the IWW. They were attra

tant labor policies but were put off by} sectarianism. Eventually the Commun} Party inherited the best in the tradi} of the Industrial Workers of the Woe and the best of the men and women j contributed to the IWW’s brief but signi cant history.