REPORT.

To the Legislature:

OFFICE OF THE

BOARD OF MEDIATION AND ARBITRATION,

ALBANY, January 22, 1896.

Over 400 strikes and lockouts occurred in this State during the year ending October 31, 1895. This board has information of 417, and included in these are several of the same trade ordered successively in different workshops, the total number of strikes being about the same as during the preceding year. Eighty of these strikes or lockouts lasted less than twenty-four hours, while nearly two hundred others were settled within three or four days of their inception. Others dragged along for weeks. The board constantly intervened in such cases, and in many instances final adjustment was arrived at on a basis proposed by the commissioners.

Among the cases in which the board mediated were:

Printers in a publishing house, New York.

Iron moulders, Brooklyn.

Weavers in woolen mill, Seneca Falls.

Shoemakers, Boerum street, Brooklyn.

Diamond workers, New York and Brooklyn.

Workers in worsted mills, Jamestown.

Electrical wiremen, New York, and building trades in sympathy.

Buttonhole makers, Rochester.

Spanish and Cuban cigarmakers, New York.

Stone cutters, Brooklyn.

Capmakers, New York.

Knit goods workers, Rochester.

Fire brick workers, Troy.

Shoemakers, Bay State Company, Brooklyn.

Shoemakers, Rochester.

Spinners, Oswego Falls.

Cigarmakers, New York.

Garment workers, Rochester.

Cigarmakers, Albany.

Federation of Labor tailors, New York.

Cloakmakers, New York.

And a number of cases of less importance in different sections of the State.

The most disastrous strike took place on January 14, 1895, when about 4,500 men employed in various capacities by trolley railroads of Brooklyn quit work. The workmen claimed that the strike was precipitated by the locking-out of some of their associates at the barns of certain of the companies. The strikers were members of District Assembly No. 75, of the Knights of Labor. Agreements fixing the conditions of labor had for several years been entered into between the roads and their employes. The Brooklyn Heights company controlled the largest system, embrac ing twenty-six different lines. Its agreement expired in January. Conferences were held before the strike, with a view to renewal of the agreement between the executive board of District Assembly No. 75 and officials of the company. Similar conferences were held by the committee of the workmen with the officials of the

forty

latest of these conferences were attended by a member of this
board, who endeavored to prevent the breach then threatening.
The men demanded an advance in wages of twenty-five cents per
day, and the maintaining of the proportion of two-thirds "full-
day" men to one-third "trippers or extra men. Just before the
tie-up the men waived the demand for additional pay, but insisted
on the proposed number of " trippers." This the companies refused
to concede, and a tie-up was ordered on all the lines in the city. On
the morning of the first day satisfactory arrangements were made
with the officers of the Brooklyn and Coney Island railroad, and
the men on that system remained at work. Those employed on the
Brooklyn Heights, Atlantic Avenue, Queens County and Subur-
ban, and Brooklyn City and Newtown systems went out
three lines in all. This board at once undertook to settle the dif-
erences between the companies and the strikers, among whom were
included motormen, conductors, linemen, electricians, and other
employes. At two o'clock on the morning of the fourth day of the
strike the board effected a settlement between the officials of the
Brooklyn City and Newtown company and its striking employes,
and the same day the 300 men on that system returned to work.
As the board was unable to bring about an adjustment on the other
lines an investigation was had, the results of which were embodied
in a special report to the Legislature of 1895, and which may be
found in another part of this annual report. During the one
month's existence of the strike, the board made repeated efforts
in conjunction with the mayor of Brooklyn, to adjust the troubles,
and would have been successful in the case of the Queens County
and Suburban system had the conciliatory disposition shown by
the officers of that company been reciprocated by the
representatives of the 650 strikers. The officers of the two

largest systems declined to arbitrate or treat with the strikers, despite the fact that the companies were unable to fill the places of the old men with competent workers, and further, that the city of Brooklyn was an armed camp, the militia of New York city and Brooklyn having been called to assist the police in preserving order, at the request of the mayor. On February 16, the strike was declared off, and many of the strikers were taken back. A boycott by organized labor was prosecuted against the roads until August 9th, when the board, through one of its members, secured concessions from the new management of the Brooklyn Heights company, by which the old employes were guaranteed situations as rapidly as vacancies occurred, and the boycott on that system was removed. As a result a large majority of the former employes of that company had been reinstated at the close of this report.

This board has in former reports recommended action by the Legislature regulating the relations between corporations created by the State to serve the public and their employes. It now renews those recommendations in the hope that a law will be enacted by which it will be made imperative upon corporations engaged in public service, and their workmen, in the event of threatened strike or lockout, to submit their differences to some designated State authority for adjustment, to the end that the people may not be denied their right to the use of such corporate conveniences or necessities. The recommendations referred to were originally suggested by disastrous strikes on railroads of the State, which have been of annual occurrence.

There is a constant demand from numbers of workingmen for additional legislation which will enlarge the powers of this board, Some of the workers imagine that compulsory arbitration would be a panacea for the strike evil, under the mistaken belief that it

would, as a rule, mean the compelling of employers to accede to demands of the laborers, forgetful that in arbitration both sides must be taken into consideration. Others of the workers declare their opposition to compulsory arbitration, and the recent National Convention of the American Federation of Labor adopted a resolution protesting against the enactment of any law for arbitration which would by contract or otherwise make it an offense to leave employment at any time or for any reason deemed sufficient by the worker himself. In this, as to private employment, the convention was no doubt correct.

This board was created in 1886 for the relief of workingmen and to mitigate the strike evil. It has met with success commensurate with the powers vested in it, and the delicate work in hand, which requires patience, tact and diplomacy. That it is difficult to enlarge its powers without infringing on the rights of employer and workman is evidenced by the fact that other States in which boards were subsequently instituted, or arbitration laws enacted, have almost uniformly adopted the law under which this board was created. We fail to recognize the utility of compulsory arbitration, except in a form that may apply to corporations of a public character, created for the primary and paramount object of service to the people.

The sentiment in favor of mediation by a third party in cases of labor disputes continues to grow. In States in which no State boards exist, even with arbitration laws on their statute books, the intervention of a third party between contestants occurs only when an unusually disastrous strike takes place, and when the public peace is seriously threatened. Disinterested citizens are diffident about meddling in these disputes. A strike may go on in-. definitely without an effort to adjust differences and end the suffer