board or central committee . . . and, whereas a president can only be in one place at one time and can only personally organize the working class in the district in which he is; he, therefore, can only act in the capacity of an organizer. . . . [Moreover,] the expense of a president [$150 per month] would support at least four class-conscious organizers. . . .1 Commenting on this conference, J. M. O'Neill remarks that "there is a vast difference between being class-conscious and being class-crazy."

1

An inkling of the beautifully chaotic condition of affairs no later than December, 1905, is given by the comments of Max Hayes in the International Socialist Review for January, 1906.

I am told by a prominent member of the I. W. W. [he says] that not all is lovely in that organization, that the original industrialists and the departmentalists are lining up to give battle, and that in some places where the DeLeonites and the Anarchists had combined and held control the Socialists obtained possession of the machinery. . . . "If a convention were held next month," an industrialist writes, "the element in control in Chicago last July wouldn't be one, two, three, and I predict that at the next convention the academic vagaries forced upon us by the DeLeon-Anarchist combine will be dropped for a plain fighting program that everybody can understand and conjure with." Rumors are in the air that the Western Miners and President Sherman and his friends are souring on DeLeon and Secretary Trautmann and his followers.3

The principal charge against President Sherman was that of misdirected and generally extravagant expenditure of the funds of the organization. The auditing committee at the 1906 convention reported that "the expenditures of the

་

1 "I. W. W. Conference Proceedings," loc. cit., pp. 12, 13.

> "That Conference at Chicago,” Miner's Magazine, Sept. 6, 1906, p. 7. 3 International Socialist Review, vol. vi, p. 435.

" 1

ex-General President show gross extravagance and strong evidence of corruption. During a period of thirty-three days he flung away on a junketing trip, not a single local being organized by him at any time, the sum of $731.55. William E. Trautmann, the General SecretaryTreasurer, reported that he was "compelled to pay bills under protest for services never rendered, or for such things as should be considered an insult and outrage against the entire membership.2

The opponents of Sherman did not believe that these alleged offenses were either the most important or the most dangerous of his pernicious activities. When the case finally came before the Master in Chancery, there was among the affidavits filed in the case of St. John versus Sherman one by a certain Lillian Farberg,

who swears that Sherman . . . told her that a conference had been held at Denver, which was attended by himself (Sherman), James Kirwan, J. M. O'Neill, and Victor Berger (of Milwaukee). At this conference Sherman said an understanding had been reached that the Western Federation of Miners should endorse the Industrial Workers of the World, that later at the convention of the I. W. W. such action would be taken as would result in the radical element [the "tramps " and "beggars"] being thrown out of the organization, and that Victor Berger at the conference had promised that if this was done the Socialist party would endorse the I. W. W.3

The foregoing charges were flatly denied by J. M. O'Neill, the editor of the Miners' Magazine; at the fifteenth convention of the W. F. M., he repudiated these and other accusations made by the "DeLeon coterie" and offered $500

1 Proceedings, Second I. W. W. Convention (1901), p. 587. 2 Ibid., p. 58.

3 Industrial Workers of the World Bulletin No. 4, Dec. 1, 1906.

reward for the establishment of the truth of any of them.1 Delegate Parks, one of the wage slave" delegates, de

clared that

... it is the general opinion of the members of the revolutionary element of this convention that there was among some of the departments of the Industrial Workers of the World corruption, graft, and fakiration which would put to shame the worst of the American Federation of Labor.2

Immediately on the adjournment of the 1907 convention. ex-President Sherman issued a statement "to officers and members of all local unions and all departments of the Industrial Workers of the World" in which he declared, "that the recent convention . . . violated the constitution in various ways"; "that the convention was controlled by the members of the Socialist Labor party under the leader. ship of Daniel DeLeon," and that this "most disgraceful gathering" was "illegal and unconstitutional." A month later Sherman issued on his own behalf a letter to the I. W. W. membership, in which he denied the various charges of extravagance and connivance at illegal tactics on his part. In this letter Sherman says that not a vote was cast on any important matter in this so-called convention until DeLeon had been consulted, or he had given them the "wise business wink."

66

As far as parliamentary convention tactics are concerned there is no doubt that both factions displayed a lofty contempt for parlor etiquette. Several months later William

'Proceedings, 15th W. F. M. Convention, pp. 177-8.

'Proceedings, Second I. W. W. Convention (1906), p. 226.

3 Statement dated Oct. 4, 1906, Miners' Magazine, Oct. 11, 1906, col. 2, p. 7.

* Letter dated Nov. 6, 1906, Miners Magazine, Nov. 22, 1906, p. II. Sherman published another letter in his own defence in the Miners' Magazine of Nov. 1, 1906, pp. 10-11.

D. Haywood wrote to St. John in regard to this matter. He emphatically condemned "Shermanism," but goes on: "You were entirely too harsh, unnecessarily so; the Gordian, presidential and other knots that you cut with a broad axe were only slip knots that could have been easily untied." "In this way," he concludes, " much dissension could have been avoided." An anarchist sympathizer with the "proletarian rabble" frankly writes: "Some might claim that the action of the convention of 1906 was illegal . . . [but] in a crisis there is no question of legality. It is the time for deeds. . . .'

2

Seven days had elapsed since the opening of the convention before the reports of officers were given. During this time-nearly half the time the convention was in sessionalmost nothing was accomplished. This delay made very plausible indeed the accusation made by the "wage slave " delegates that the reactionaries had deliberately planned to force them out of the convention by resort to these dilatory tactics. Whether or not the Sherman faction had decided on such tactics, there is no question but that the freezing out of the "wage slaves" would be a very natural result. Article VI. of the Constitution provided that "the expenses of delegates attending the convention shall be borne by their respective organizations." Now many of the local unions could afford to provide their delegates with adequate expense money; others could afford but very inadequate provision for expenses. Thus, most of the delegates from unions in the Mining Department -and those in general from the relatively better established unions were quite well provided for, the Miners' delegates, e. g., receiving mileage plus five dollars per day expense money for every day

1 Letter dated Ada County Jail, Boise, Idaho, March 17, 1907. Published in Proceedings 15th Convention, W. F. M. (1907), p. 584. "Jean Spielman, Mother Earth, Dec., 1907, p. 458.

they were away from home. The great majority, however, were paid nothing but mileage and were obliged to pay their own expenses and had come with funds absolutely insufficient for a prolonged meeting. Delegate Lingenfelter, in a speech in support of an unsuccessful motion to allow proxies to delegates who were compelled to leave on account of lack of funds, said:

These dilatory tactics that have been pursued by the opposition have prolonged the convention, due to their express determination, in my opinion, to freeze out these wage slave delegates. . . . Only last night the boys came to me and said: . . . "We can't stand it any longer; we are going broke; we can't sleep in boxcars and eat handouts and remain here." 1

The "beggars" gained the upper hand. Mr. DeLeon succeeded in putting through a motion to suspend the above mentioned article of the Constitution concerning delegates' expenses, and a resolution was finally passed which authorized the payment of $1.50 per day from the general treasury to all without the necessary expense money.2

In this way the Trautmann-DeLeon-St. John faction secured control of the convention and brought about the deposition of President Sherman-the first and last President of the Industrial Workers of the World. The convention now proceeded to consider some of the problems of industrial unionism which had cropped out in the course of twelve months' experience. Meanwhile ex-President Sherman and his followers had decided to stand pat—but not on the floor of the convention. They took possession of the General Headquarters and with the assistance of the police successfully held them against all comers.

1 Proceedings, Second I. W. W. Convention (1906), p. 20.

2 By a vote of 378 to 237, ibid., pp. 80, 94