. III, p. 340. Roosevelt's opening address to the Oct. 3, 1902, White House Conference, TRP. Cartoons Dealing with the 1902 Anthracite Coal Strike. This would spare the operators from dealing directly with the miners' union and show the public that the coal industry would arbitrate with its workers.43, Morgan asked Root to come to New York. The owners refused to meet or to arbitrate with the union; the union struck on September 17, 1900, with results that surprised even the union, as miners of all different nationalities and ethnicities walked out in support of the union. The strike never resumed, as the miners received a 10% wage increase and reduced workdays from ten to nine hours; the owners got a higher price for coal and did not recognize the trade union as a bargaining agent. By contrast the strikes of the radical Western Federation of Miners in the West often turned into full-scale warfare between strikers and both employers and the civil and military authorities. Letter, Theodore Roosevelt to Winthrop Murray Crane (Governor of Massachusetts), Oct. 22, 1902, in Elting E. Morrison, ed. with the certainty of riots which might develop into social war. 215-16. John Mitchell played a prominent role in presenting the case for the miners. Pennypacker. Proposed plan for an organization for the execution of trade agreements.--I. 1902, Roosevelt Letters, Vol. This strike was successfully mediated through the intervention of the federal government, which strove to provide a "Square Deal"—which Roosevelt took as the motto for his administration—to both sides. 15, The miners struck on May 12, 1902. [citation needed], The United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) had won a sweeping victory in the 1897 strike by the soft-coal (bituminous coal) miners in the Midwest, winning significant wage increases. Both sides struck a bonanza as operators raised both wages and prices. Anthracite Coal Strike. "The child is born," wrote Carroll Wright, "and I trust will prove a vigorous ... member of society. The miners had asked for an eight-hour day and were awarded a nine-hour day instead of the standard ten hours then prevailing. Tens of millions of city dwellers needed coal to heat their homes. The site is secure. III (New York, International Publishers, 1947), pp. [11], Roosevelt continued to try to build support for a mediated solution, persuading former president Grover Cleveland to join the commission he was creating. John Lombardi, Labor's Voice in the Cabinet (New York, Columbia University Press, 1942), p. 47; "Report of the Anthracite Coal Strike Commission," Bulletin of the Department of Labor, 46 (May 1903), pp. The operators rejected the offer. III, pp. He was apprehensive about the miners' response. "The Coal Strike of 1902 – Turning Point in U.S. With the consent of the operators, Roosevelt also added a Catholic bishop to the commission.46, Lost in the shuffle were ex-President Grover Cleveland and Commissioner of Labor Carroll Wright, who only a few days earlier were to have been the cornerstones of the President's strike settling commission. . While the operators refused to recognize the United Mine Workers, they were required to agree to a six-man arbitration board, made up of equal numbers of labor and management representatives, with the power to settle labor disputes. [21] During the extensive arbitration testimony, after company owners made claims that the strikers had killed 21 men, Mitchell disagreed strongly and offered to resign his position if they could name the men and show proof.[22]. In 1902 the Pennsylvania coal miners walked out of the mines in a wage dispute. During the dramatic confrontation with the mine operators and workers on October 3, 1902, Roosevelt had said, " I speak for neither the operators nor the miners but for the general public." Profits were low in 1902 because of an over supply; therefore the owners welcomed a moderately long strike. Letter, Roosevelt to Cleveland, Oct. 16, 1902, Roosevelt Letters, Vol. 39. John Mitchell, president of the United Mine Workers, represented the miners. The operators, on the other hand, resented the Federal mediation which had brought about the shotgun agreement of 1900, and they bristled at the idea of renewed Federal interference.14, John Mitchell was frustrated by the refusal of employers to deal with the union. I could not if I would delegate this business management to even so highly a respectable body as the Civic Federation, nor can I call to my aid . John L. Blackman, Jr., Presidential Seizures in Labor Disputes (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1967), pp. [18] Darrow, for his part, summed up the pages of testimony of mistreatment he had obtained in the soaring rhetoric for which he was famous: "We are working for democracy, for humanity, for the future, for the day will come too late for us to see it or know it or receive its benefits, but which will come, and will remember our struggles, our triumphs, our defeats, and the words which we spake. Five-hundred fifty-eight witnesses appeared, including 240 for the striking miners, 153 for nonunion mineworkers, and 154 for the operators. Wright, "Report to the President," pp. 57. Roy, Andrew. 361-62. III, pp. Letter, Roosevelt to Crane, Oct. 22, 1902, Roosevelt Letters, Vol. "The ten men met in my room on October 3,” Roosevelt wrote, "I being still unable to leave my wheelchair." He wanted Cleveland and other eminent men to "join" Wright. The Commission's findings seemed to split the differences between mineworkers and mine owners. Coal companies prospered, and union membership soared from 10,000 to 115,000.8. 1-866-4-USA-DOL "The Anthracite Coal Strike. 19. Wright, "Report to the President," pp.