turbances. Paterson, New Jersey, Aberdeen, South Dakota, Old Forge, Pennsylvania, and Everett, Washington, are almost the only cases of any great importance. The most serious of these was the Everett free-speech controversy which culminated in the fatal tragedy of November 6, 1916.

The attitude of the citizens of the cities where free-speech fights have been staged was naturally bitterly hostile. This was most strikingly noticeable in business and commercial circles and was of course reflected in the daily press. In San Diego during the free-speech fight the local papers, almost without exception, kept up a running fire of editorial abuse of the I.W.W.s. "Hanging is none too good for them," said the Tribune; "they would be much better dead, for they are absolutely useless in the human economy; they are the waste material of creation and should be drained off into the sewer of oblivion there to rot in cold obstruction like any other excrement." In the face of such a tirade it is interesting to read the report of the Special Commissioner sent by Governor Hiram Johnson to investigate the disturbances in San Diego. Commissioner Weinstock took pains to follow up the stories of the brutality and cruelty of the self-constituted citizens' committee of Vigilantes not only to the I.W.W.s but also to any who were outspoken enough to defend them or who were alleged to have aided and abetted them. Mr. Weinstock says that he "is frank to confess that when he became satisfied of the truth of the stories... it was hard for him to believe that he was not sojourning in Russia, conducting his investigation there instead of in this alleged land of the free and home of the brave.'

2

1 San Diego Tribune, March 4, 1912 (editorial).

2 Harris Weinstock, Report to the governor of California on the disturbances in the city and county of San Diego in 1912, p. 16.

The organization made no attempt to hold a convention in 1909, but in May, 1910, the fifth convention met in Chicago. On the first day there were twenty-two delegates present, representing forty-two local unions in the following states: California, Colorado, Montana, Rhode Island, Minnesota, Ohio, Illinois, Oregon, Washington, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Indiana, and British Columbia. Judging from the very fragmentary records available there was little business of any importance transacted at this meeting. The delegates adopted a resolution to "reaffirm the original [Industrial Union] Manifesto of 1905. "1 and dis

persed.

In September, 1911, fifteen months later, a somewhat more successful convention was held. This sixth annual meeting of the I. W. W. was in point of size almost as insignificant as the preceding one, thirty-one delegates from eleven states being present. In addition to the regular delegates there were present three "fraternal delegates" from the Brotherhood of Timber Workers. Twenty-one locals were represented in addition to the locals included in the Textile Workers National Industrial Union of the I. W. W. -the only "national industrial union at that time included in the organization." 2 The convention was harmonious, and there is, therefore, the less to chronicle. "Most of the delegates were young men full of the fire and enthusiasm of youth. Intellectuals' were conspicuous by their absence." We are told that very few changes were made in the organic law of the organization. Proposals were made, however, by the score. In the appendix to the Minutes is a list containing seventy resolutions which were presented on

1 Proceedings, Industrial Worker (II), June 25, 1910, p. 3.

2 Minutes of the Sixth Convention (Typewritten MS.), pp. 1-3. 'B. H. Williams, "The Sixth I. W. W. Convention," International Socialist Review, vol. xii, p. 302, November, 1911.

the floor of the convention.1 The question of politics was scarcely touched upon. An anti-parliamentary resolution

was voted down without discussion. The bulk of the delegates were undoubtedly non-parliamentarians, that is to say, indifferent about politics and legislative action. An official report of the convention in the Industrial Worker says that the report of General Organizer Trautmann, which it declared would be published later in Solidarity,

was a scathing indictment of the criminal alliance between the A. F. of L. fakirs and the self-styled revolutionary socialist politicians, who, as the report shows, time and again have acted in full concert in defeating strikes rather than to allow the workers to win with I. W. W. methods-methods whose success spells ruination for the political and craft union movements which are sucking the life blood of the working class.' Mr. Trautmann later transferred his allegiance to the Socialist Labor party faction. The Weekly People (the official S. L. P. organ) of July 26, 1913, published (on page 2) a letter from Trautmann to Eugene V. Debs in which he says: In the convention of 1911 of the Industrial Workers of the World my report contained a scathing attack on the antipolitical politicians and the never-will-I-work scavengers who pose as organizers and spokesmen of the organization. The convention ordered that report to be printed . . . [but] Vincent St. John and his clique put away the report and it never appeared.

Official reports of the convention claimed that there had been “a gradual increase in the moral, financial and numerical strength of the I. W. W." This claim is not entirely justified by available figures. The number of locals in the

1 Appendix to the Minutes, pp. 1-9.

2 Industrial Worker (II.), Sept. 28, 1911, p. 4, col. I.

organization was but slightly, if any, greater. Fewer charters were issued and more locals disbanded in 1911 than in 1910. The membership figures are conflicting, those furnished by the Secretary-Treasurer making a less favorable showing than those of Professor Barnett. Mr. St. John says that the membership of the organization in good standing in October, 1911, was about 10,000.

We do not claim anything [he said] except membership in good standing; as a matter of fact, however, the General Office has issued 60,000 due books in the past eighteen months and of this number only about one in ten keeps in good standing, due to the kind of work the membership of the most part follow. They are engaged in construction, harvesting and working in the woods, etc. This means that they are out of touch with the organization the greater part of the year either on the job or moving about the country looking for work, and of course they cannot and do not keep in good standing, but as they drift into town they pay up. In passing, it may be stated that the above number is the largest membership the I. W. W. has had since its inception, except when the W. F. of M. was supposed to be a part of the organization. I know that the second annual convention reports claim 60,000 members, but the books of the organization did not justify any such claim; in fact, the average paid-up membership with the W. F. of M. for the first year of the organization was 14,000 members in round numbers.2

There was at this time a very considerable gain in particular industries, such as metal working and railroad and building construction. This development is indicated in Table 1, which shows the average membership of the I. W. W. in the specified industries during the period 19101913:

1 See Appendix iv, Table A.

2 Letter to the author, Oct. 13, 1911.

TABLE 11

AVERAGE MEMBERSHIP (CHICAGO) I. W. W.-1910-1913, BY INDUSTRIES

If figures are ever misleading, they are so in reference to the "Wobblies." They are presented, however, in the belief that they have some significance. The organization was now unquestionably picking up. In 1910 there had been a number of I. W. W. strikes-nine at any rate in which the organization was actively interested. In April, the farm hands of North Yamhill, Oregon, who "had been handing

1 Compiled from figures furnished by General Secretary St. John (Letter of Feb. 1, 1915).