Old trade lines are instantly shifting, creating the
most perplexing problem of inter-union amity. Over two score
jurisdictional controversies appear for settlement at each annual
convention of the American Federation. The Association of
Longshoremen and the Seamen's Union, for example, both claim
jurisdiction over employees in marine warehouses. The
cigar-makers and the stogie-makers have also long been at swords'
points. Who shall have control over the coopers who work in
breweries--the Brewery Workers or the Coopers' Union? Who shall
adjust the machinery in elevators--the Machinists or Elevator
Constructors? Is the operator of a linotype machine a typesetter?
So plasterers and carpenters, blacksmiths and structural iron
workers, printing pressmen and plate engravers, hod carriers and
cement workers, are at loggerheads; the electrification of a
railway creates a jurisdictional problem between the electrical
railway employees and the locomotive engineers; and the marble
workers and the plasterers quarrel as to the setting of imitation
marble. These quarrels regarding the claims of rival unions
reveal the weakness of the Federation as an arbitral body. There
is no centralized authority to impose a standard or principle
which could lead to the settlement of such disputes. Trade
jealousy has overcome the suggestions of the peacemakers that
either the nature of the tools used, or the nature of the
operation, or the character of the establishment be taken as the
basis of settlement.
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