The Federal Labor Agent Who Walked Seattle’s Strike Map
In 1895, a U.S. Labor Department investigator arrived to untangle seven years of strikes and lockouts—and expected his hardest case in the Coeur d’Alene mines.
Charles W. Thompson, special agent of the United States Department of Labor, arrived in the city yesterday and will remain until Sunday looking into the strikes and lockouts—except those of last year on the Great Northern and Northern Pacific—that have taken place in this vicinity during the past seven years. Mr. Thompson’s territory covers the two Dakotas, Montana, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Utah, New Mexico and Colorado; after finishing in this state he will have the latter states to examine.
In conversation with a Post-Intelligencer representative at the Rainier-Grand last night, Mr. Thompson said: “My trip here is to look into all the strikes and lockouts that have occurred in this portion of the state during the past seven years, excepting the recent strikes on the Northern Pacific and Great Northern, which will be handled from the St. Paul end. From what I learn I expect to experience the most trouble with the big strike and riot in the Coeur d’Alene mines. My duties are to secure evidence from both sides, and submit my report accordingly. I expect to be kept busy until Saturday night, and will then leave for Spokane. I started in on this western tour in North Dakota on March 2, and since then have investigated all the troubles in that state, South Dakota, Montana, Idaho and nearly all of this state. The hardest case I have yet seen starting out was the great Coeur d’Alene labor trouble.”
He explained that the difficulty of investigating a strike was to find out how long it lasted, what was the cause, and the loss both to the employees and owners. Before being assigned to this western country he had New York City to work on, and when they finished it was discovered that over 9,000 strikes had occurred in New York City in seven years. It was estimated that there have been over 40,000 strikes in the United States during the past seven years. There are twenty agents in the department, and he believed that when the work is finished they expected to get through by July 1, and will then start on what promises to be the largest detail the department has ever attempted—investigating the introduction of labor-saving machinery within the past fifty years.
“My duties are to secure evidence from both sides, and submit my report accordingly.”
Federal labor investigators still arrive in Seattle to sort out strikes and lockouts, though the Department of Labor of 1895 had only twenty agents for the whole country. The story captures a moment when the Great Northern and Northern Pacific disputes, and the Coeur d’Alene troubles, made the Northwest a labor battleground.
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