The thirty-sixth convention of the American Federation of Labor, which will begin its annual meeting in Baltimore, Md., November 13, will present a striking contrast to the first convention of the A. F. of L. held in that city in 1887. Then there were 58 delegates representing 600,000 organized workers. This year there will be approximately 350 delegates representing about 2,090,000. They meet to consider and determine matters affecting the welfare of the millions who work for wages they represent the organized workers or the fighting force of the wage earners who establish and uphold the rights of all.

Each successive convention of the A. F. of L. has given the nation a clearer understanding of the labor movement and economic organization. Though the delegates to these conventions deal with problems of poverty and injustice, they do not, like incompetents, invoke the compassion and benevolence of society, but in the spirit of democracy they organize to protect fellow-workers and to secure what they ought to have.

The men and women who live their wo king hours in the cotton mills or the packing houses, know that without their necessary labor the meat would not nourish or the cotton cloth protect human bodies. Those who handle the tools of industry live close to its facts-they know that those who render the human labor power necessary to production co-operate with those who furnish materials and direct opcations to produce the marvelous, manifold articles of material civilization. But this co-operation has never bcen recognized where the workers did

not organize to enforce their rights. The rights they demand are based upon existing facts of production.

The vital forces and centers of national life are those which are fundamental in the lives of the citizensthey focus round efforts to earn a living. The economic organization of the nation is more vital than the political, hence economic power is stronger than political. Wage-earners rightly look to their economic organizations for protection and for the future.

The Baltimore Convention will constitute a great national congress which will legislate for wage earners and will set in action decisions that will affect not only wage-earners but the other cooperators in industry-employers and managers. Each of these gatherings enables the wage-earners to define more clearly their rights as workers and as human beings, and results in more comprehensive demands and more effective methods to establish their demands.

The organized labor movement is a hopeful constructive force that leads to better economic organization, based upon real values and real service. The effect will be far-reaching, for economic wrongs which jag their way across human lives become human wrongs.

Its deliberations and decisions will be of potence and significance because they represent ideals born out of the lives of the masses.

Employers, statesmen, politicians, exploiters, as well as fellow workers of this and all countries will follow with keen interest the deliberations and conclusions reached by the A. F. of L. Baltimore Convention.

From the inception of the American Federation of Labor it has taken the stand that while unions for the various trades and callings must each and all be left entirely free to govern themselves within their own borders, yet between the members of all these unions there should be a bond as great as that between the members of the same organization, and it is the aim of the A. F. of L. to strengthen that bond by organization, and by education and inculcation of the feeling and consciousness of unity of interest and solidarity to place the labor movement upon a higher and more effective plane. It seeks to organize the yet unorganized workers, the skilled and the unskilled, the permanently located and the migratory.

The A. F. of L. holds that whatever a man may be so long as he works honestly and seeks to wrong no other man or to advantage himself at the cost to another, and seeks to maintain this standard regardless of how any toilers may happen to be employed, he is a man. Though the A. F. of L. does not advocate strikes, yet it encourages them when all other means to obtain justice for the toilers have failed. It urges that the workers when struck, strike back as best they can. Though strikes do not always win, even those alleged to be lost at least induce employers to forbear in the future and teach them a lesson they do not readily forget: namely, that labor is the most important factor in production and entitled to a voice in the question of wages, hours, and conditions under which work shall be performed.

The A. F. of L. stands as the most potent factor in all our country in defense of the right of free assemblage, free speech, and free press. It endeavors to unite all classes of wageearners under one head through their

several organizations with the purpose in view that class, race, creed, political, and trade prejudices may be abolished and that moral and financial support may be given to all. It aims to allow in the light of experience the utmost liberty of each organization in the conduct of its own affairs consistent with the generally understood practice of the identity and solidarity of labor.

The A. F. of L. establishes intercommunication; creates agitation and educates not only the workers but the educators. It is in direct correspondence and conference with the representative workers and thinkers the world over. It urges the interest of the toilers in Congress, State Legislatures, municipal legislative bodies, administrative offices, and judicial agencies. It initiates measures in the name of labor and liberty, and decides upon acts according as they benefit or are calculated to injure the masses of the people. It has secured vast relief from burdensome laws and governmental officials. It seeks and will achieve justice for all. It encourages and has largely achieved the interchange of ideas, ideals and methods It seeks to cultivate mutual interest, and to secure united action to announce to the world the wrongs and burdens which the toilers have too long endured. It voices the aims and hopes of the toiling masses. It asks and demands the co-operation of the organizations, co-operation and affiliation of all wage-workers who believe in the principle of unity, and that there is something better in life than long hours, low wages, unemployment and all that these imply.

The A. F. of L. endorses as basic these economic principles: That no trade or calling can long maintain wages, hours, and conditions above the

common level; that to maintain high wages all trades and callings must be organized; that lack of organization among the unskilled vitally affects the skilled, whether organized or unorganized; that generally organization of skilled and unskilled workers can be accomplished only by united actionfederation; that the history of the labor movement demonstrates the necessity for the union of individuals and that logic implies a union of unions-federation.

The A. F. of L. urges the concentration of efforts to organize all the workers within the ranks of the organized, fair and open contest for the different views which may be entertained upon measures proposed to move the grand army of labor onward and forward. In no organization on earth is there such toleration, so great a scope, and so free a forum as within the ranks of the A. F. of L. and nowhere is there such a fair opportunity afforded for the advocacy of a new or brighter thought. The A. F. of L. affirms as one of the cardinal principles of the trade union movement that the working people must organize, unite, and federate, irrespective of creed, color, sex, nationality or politics. In the language of the late William E. Gladstone, "trade unions are the bulwarks of modern democracy."

The A. F. of L. stands unalterably for the abolition of all forms of involuntary servitude and devotes its time and efforts to make every day a day of a better life.

The trade union movement fosters education and uproots ignorance; shortens hours and lengthens life; raises wages and lowers usury; increases independence and decreases dependence; develops manhood and balks tyranny; discourages selfishness and establishes fraternity; induces liberality and reduces prejudice; creates rights and abolishes wrongs; lightens toil and brightens man; makes the workers' workshop safe and brighter; cheers the home and fireside and makes the world better.

BRICKLAYERS JOIN A. F. OF L. Washington, Nov.-The American Federation of Labor has issued a charter to the Bricklayers, Masons and Plasterers' International Union of

America.

While an agitation for affiliation has been conducted for years among the bricklayers, definite action was taken at their recent convention, held in Toronto, Canada, when the international executives were empowered to act.

In the charter application, signed by President Bowen and Secretary Dobson, it is stated that there are 912 local unions, with a membership of 70,000, affiliated to this international.

In a telegram to President Bowen, of the bricklayers, dated October 12, President Gompers says:

"The charter for your International Union has been issued to-day. I welcome your organization into the family of trade unions of America under the banner of the American Federation of Labor."

The A. F. of L. executive supplemented these fraternal expressions with a letter in which he said, in part:

"It is gratifying beyond measure to know that due to the efforts of many of us continued over a long period of years that your International Union has finally come into the family of trade unions under the banner of the American Federation of Labor. I am confident that that action will have great influence with the few international unions still unaffiliated, and that the day is near at hand when it can be truthfully said that every bona fide international and local trade union of America will be banded together in the bonds of unity, fraternity and solidarity in the most beneficent voluntary association of the workers existing anywhere in the world, the American Federation of Labor."

The woman who thinks she would be happy if she had a vote is usually the same woman who used to think she would be happy if she had a husband

New York, November.-The four months' strike of the 2,700 Textile Workers of the New York Mills Corporation in New York Mills, New York, has just ended in a complete and sweeping victory for the workers and for union organization. "One of the greatest victories ever secured by the United Textile Workers of America," are the words in which the settlement of the strike is described by Mr. John Golden, General President of the United Textile Workers of America.

In a letter conveying the thanks of the Executive Board of the Textile Workers to the Committee on Industrial Relations for the help given by the committee in exposing the wrongs done to the striking workers, and in bringing about the victory of the work. ers, Mr. Golden gives the terms of settlement as follows:

"A 10 per cent. increase in wages to all the strikers.

"All those evicted from the company tenements to be placed back in the houses from which they were evicted.

"No rents to be paid by the tenants for those weeks between July 18th and October 21st.

"Recognition of the union commit

tee.

"All strikers to be reinstated in their former positions or other positions just as good, without discrimination.

"Abolition of the card system which prevented an employe from securing work in any other mill connected with the company, after they had left their previous employment."

These terms are an absolute concession of everything demanded by the workers. The splendid significance of the victory to trades unionism is that these 2,700 workers, including many nationalities, but chiefly Polish work

ers, showed the perfect discipline of organization, and proved what such labor unionism can accomplish for the cause of industrial justice.

As the news letter of the Committee on Industrial Relations on October 9th showed, everything that could be done by harsh and cruel methods of corporation management was done, both to discourage the strikers and to taunt them into acts of violence that might have caused them to lose public sympathy and to lose the strike. Gun men and so-called "deputies" bullied and beat many of the workers; these bullies were constantly doing acts to irritate and molest the workers and the orderly picket line they had established. Families were ruthlessly set out of their homes into the streets. The most desperate but unavailing efforts were made to bring in strikebreakers and to run the strikers out of town and out of their means of livelihood. A trumped-up damage law suit for $25,000 was filed on behalf of the corporation against three or four members of, or sympathizers with, the Union in an effort to repeat another Danbury Hatters case of injustice and extortion.

But against all such measures the Union organization remained firm and unbroken. There were practically no desertions back into the mills. The most splendid spirit of solidarity and of sacrifice was maintained by the men and women who had suffered together almost indescribably in their effort to create better conditions for themselves and for their children.

When finally, through the efforts of President Golden and Mrs. Sara Conboy, Secretary-Treasurer of the Textile Workers, wide-spread publicity was given by the Committee on Industrial Relations to the strike conditions,

and when a further appeal to local unions of the textile workers promised further assistance to the strikers, the New York Mills Corporation surrendered completely. As one of the incidents of the settlement, the general manager of the corporation severed his connections with the companywhether by resignation or by discharge being unknown and being immaterial. The great and lasting result is by their own efforts and by their own united demands the 2,700 workers in the New York Mills Corporation and its subsidiary companies have demonstrated the power of collective bargaining and union organization. They have won a great fight, not only for themselves, but also for the cause of labor.

PROFITABLE EXPERIMENT.

San Francisco, Nov.-The Bulletin is responsible for the following story of how the citizens have profited financially as a result of the municipalization of the Geary street car line:

"Municipal ownership did not win its fight in San Francisco without a struggle. It is not difficult for even very young persons to remember the weighty arguments that were used to discourage the taking over of the Geary street road. One argument was that the road was certain to be mismanaged, since it was a municipal enterprise, and all municipal enterprises are doomed to be mismanaged;

that it would fail to pay expenses, and that the taxpayers would have to make good an annual deficit. Now the success of the city lines is so generally taken for granted that the yearly reports of net profits create no surprise.

"Because the feat has been quietly accomplished, the man in the street -or, rather, in the street car-does not marvel that his transportation managers have been able to meet all operating expenses, all overhead charges, and all allowances for depreciation, and still leave nearly $200,000 in the cash register. But his silent acceptance of the gift of honest transportation does not represent apathy. If anybody tried to take the municipal roads away from the city his roar of indignation would be heard across the continent. This is the way new issues make their way in the world-first to be fought over, then to be installed under the pressure of a majority, and finally to be cheerfully accepted by every one as an every-day matter of course, like sunrise and breakfast."

BUILDING TRADES TO MEET. Washington.-President Williams, of the A. F. of L. Building Trades Department, has issued the call for the tenth annual convention to convene in Baltimore, Monday, November 27. Meetings will be held at Moose Hall, 410 West Fayette street. The New Howard Hotel has been selected as the official headquarters.