The Lumber Barons and the 'Request' to Quit the Union
A fiery editorial from The Labor Journal exposes the intimidation tactics used by mill owners to keep workers from organizing.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Managers of the local mills recently distributed a note to employees claiming they could deal 'fairly' with their men without the interference of a 'walking delegation' from any union. The company urges men to remain 'free and independent,' while reminding them that they are allowed to work ten hours a day for the 'munificent' wage of $2.25. The editorial scoffs at the suggestion that mill workers are living in luxury and warns that the Weyerhaeuser syndicate, should they face organizing efforts by the IWW, will likely wrap themselves in the flag and call on authorities to drive out the organizers as anarchists.
“Of course this could not be construed as a threat! Just a dignified 'request' from a big-hearted corp to its men to remember the fatherly solicitude it has always shown toward them.”
The tension between corporate 'paternalism' and the right to organize remains a recurring theme in Everett’s history, echoing modern labor disputes over worker classification and collective bargaining power in the local industrial and service sectors.
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