EARNINGS OF CONTRACT MINERS AND THEIR LABORERS, AND AVERAGE NUMBER OF HOURS WORKED PER DAY AND RATE PER HOUR AND DAY, FROM JANUARY 16 TO 31, 1902, INCLUSIVE-Continued.

a Miners pay their laborers all sorts of prices, in some instances more than one-third of the gross earnings.

EARNINGS OF CONTRACT MINERS AND THEIR LABORERS, AND AVERAGE NUMBER OF HOURS WORKED PER DAY AND RATE PER HOUR AND DAY, FROM JANUARY 16 TO 31, 1902, INCLUSIVE-Concluded.

[The discrepancies shown in the different districts are due to the names having been selected at random. The average earnings of all the men in the different mines varies but little.]

a Miners pay their laborers all sorts of prices, in some instances more than one-third of the gross earnings.

APPENDIX E.-REPORT OF INTERVIEW OF COMMISSIONER OF LABOR WITH MESSRS. GEORGE F. BAER, R. M. OLYPHANT, E. B. THOMAS, AND DAVID WILLCOX.

NEW YORK, June 10, 1902.

MEETING AT OFFICE OF THE DELAWARE AND HUDSON COMPANY.

Present: Mr. Carroll D. Wright, Commissoner of Labor; Mr. George F. Baer, Mr. R. M. Olyphant, Mr. E. B. Thomas, Mr. David Willcox.

Mr. Wright read the demands, as stated to him by Mr. Mitchell. Mr. Baer then made a statement, as follows:

We have never had a formal demand made upon us for anything other than a uniform scale of wages for the whole region. Mr.

Mitchell, before the Civic Federation, presented substantially the demands named in the statement you have read.

Mr. THOMAS. With one exception. He demanded that all coal be weighed.

Mr. WILLCOX. In his final telegram Mr. Mitchell states these demands without suggesting any willingness to make any conditions at all.

Mr. BAER. The only formal statement we have of the demands is contained in Mr. Mitchell's dispatch. When the Civic Federation appointed the subcommittee, consisting of Mr. Mitchell and the other district presidents of the anthracite region and Mr. Thomas, Mr. Truesdale, and myself [Mr. Baer], it was then understood that no report should be made of any proceedings except to the Civic Federation, which was to be called together thereafter by the chairman. Primarily on this account we have hitherto declined to give a public statement. For reasons satisfactory to the Civic Federation no meeting was ever called to hear the report of the committee. Now, however, that the President desires information, we first submit the correspondence between Mr. Mitchell and the presidents of the coal companies, together with a statement of the history of the negotiations. (Appendix C.)

At the request of the Civic Federation we met a committee of the Civic Federation, Mr. Mitchell, and his three district presidents, and spent one whole day discussing the questions at issue between us. This first meeting resulted in an adjournment for thirty days, Mr. Mitchell agreeing on his part to withdraw the order which had been issued to the men not to work more than three days a week after the 1st of April. At the expiration of the thirty days we again met the Civic Federation committee and Mr. Mitchell's committee, together with a delegation representing, as we understood it, the local organizations. There were probably twenty or more miners and mine workers' representatives at that meeting. Every phase of the situation was fully and fairly discussed. We endeavored to convince them that it was impracticable to increase wages; that it was impossible to establish an eight-hour day; that many of the men (the miners) only work from four to six hours a day now. We explained fully why a uniform schedule of wages could not be adopted in the anthracite region such as was common in the bituminous fields, by pointing out the great variety of work, the different classes of labor required, the peculiar condition of the veins, varying in depth, in pitch, in impurities, etc. At the end of a full day's discussion, at the request of the Civic Federation, the committee I have heretofore referred to was created. We spent two whole days together rediscussing the situation. The meetings were entirely friendly and harmonious. We exhibited our annual reports. We offered to exhibit any of our books

to verify our statements. This offer had heretofore been made before the Civic Federation and was again repeated. We asked them to name any information they desired, and it would be furnished them. No practical conclusion was reached except this: That the operators stood on their offer to continue the existing wages for another year from the 1st of April and thereafter subject to sixty days' notice.

The history of the strike begins from the time the United Mine Workers was a bituminous organization. Some time in the beginning of 1900, or the latter part of 1899, they succeeded in organizing a number of local unions in the Schuylkill region. In 1900 they inaugurated a strike in the upper coal regions. This strike did not extend to the Schuylkill region for some time. Finally, through sympathy, the anthracite mine workers in the Schuylkill region struck. There was the usual violence and calling out of the military to protect property. Shortly after this strike was inaugurated Senator Hanna met a number of gentlemen and insisted that if the strike were not settled it would extend to Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, and the election of Mr. McKinley and Mr. Roosevelt would be endangered. He insisted that he was authorized to settle the strike, through Mr. Mitchell, if the operators would agree to a 10 per cent advance in wages. After a great deal of pressure had been brought to bear upon the presidents of the coal companies and positive assurances were given that the situation was really dangerous, President McKinley sending to me personally a gentleman to assure me that Ohio and Indiana were in danger unless some adjustment was made, we agreed to put up a notice which was prepared, as we understood, at Indianapolis and furnished by the United Mine Workers. The private operators absolutely refused to join in this advance, and, instead of the strike being ended as promised, it continued on for some time, and it became necessary, in order to relieve the situation, to call a meeting of the private operators with the presidents of the coal companies and to agree with them that if they would put up notices to pay 10 per cent increase we would meet a committee which they should appoint and endeavor to increase, if possible, the price of coal. They agreed to this, a committee was appointed by the private operators, and we sat two or three days a month for three months to reach an agreement with them. That agreement involved a heavy compensation to the private operators from the coal companies. The coal companies had to agree to change the basis of coal purchased from the private operators from a basis of 40 per cent and 60 per cent to a basis of 35 per cent and 65 per cent. In other words, we had to decrease 5 per cent and they increased 5 per cent.

Just before April we had another conference with the leaders of the mine workers, and they agreed that if we would continue the advance of wages for another year it would be satisfactory. In point of fact,

the advance in the upper regions was 10 per cent, as was agreed upon, but in the Schuylkill region, by reason of the Schuylkill mines having worked during part of the strike, and the coal having advanced in price, the basis increased and the actual increase to the Reading Coal and Iron Company thereby became 16 per cent instead of 10 per cent. Prior to the time of the strike in 1900 the basis of wages had been settled and proved satisfactory in the Schuylkill region and in the Lehigh region for a period of nearly thirty years. The wages were paid on a system of profit sharing. The basis was that when coal at Schuylkill Haven was worth $2.50 a ton the wages should be paid according to a scale then adopted, and that for each increase of 3 cents in the price of coal 1 per cent should be added to the miners' wages. For illustration: If a miner on this basis received $2 a ton and coal advanced to $2.24, the wages of the miner were increased 8 per cent, equivalent on a $2 basis (which is merely an illustration) to 16 cents. To show you how that would work out if no change had been made in the wages in the strike of 1900: The men on the old basis of $2.50 a ton would have received in October, 1900, 15 per cent advance; in November, 16 per cent advance, and in December, 16 per cent advance. In September, 1901, they would have received 20 per cent advance. In the other months, the percentage, being according to the price of coal, as in the summer months coal is lower, would fall, so that practically the 16 per cent advance made was no greater than they would have received under the sliding schedule.

The workings of the mines after the agreement was made with the mine workers proved very unsatisfactory. They attempted to enforce the collection of dues from their members. It is well known that when labor conditions become normal the mine workers refuse to pay their dues. In periods of excitement they pay. Last year the United Mine Workers insisted that we should permit one of their representatives to stand at the mine entrances and compel every man to produce a card of his organization showing that he was in good standing and had paid his dues. This was the source of a number of strikes and much trouble, we peremptorily refusing to do it. The object was to prevent nonunion men from going into the mines. They knew it would not do to use force, but if they could establish the fact that it was to the advantage of every miner to belong to the union and that he would be looked upon with disfavor unless he did, they hoped to succeed. They went further. At a number of collieries they absolutely refused to work with nonunion men. One colliery, the Temple, of which I am president, in an emergency employed carpenters who happened to be nonunion men. The miners immediately struck, shut down the colliery, and refused to go to work unless we discharged these carpenters. That is a sample of what was going on all over the region, so that in one year, notwithstanding this agreement, we had 102 strikes in mines