a bargaining equality with their employer, nor can they be
represented by a spokesman of the necessary ability if their choice be
restricted to those working in the same plant. The employers, now no
longer dominated by the War-time spirit which caused them in 1917 to
tolerate an expansion of unionism, insisted that no employer must be
obliged to meet for the purpose of collective bargaining with other
than his own employes.[89] After two weeks of uncertainty, when it had
become clear that a resolution supported by both labor and public
groups, which restated the labor position in a milder form, would be
certain to be voted down by the employer group, the labor group withdrew
from the conference, and the conference broke up. The period of the
cooperation of classes had definitely closed.

Meantime the steel strike continued. Federal troops patrolled the steel
districts and there was no violence. Nevertheless, a large part of the
country's press pictured the strike by the steel workers for union
recognition and a normal workday as an American counterpart of the
Bolshevist revolution in Russia. Public opinion, unbalanced and excited
as it was over the whirlpool of world events, was in no position to
resist. The strike failed.

Nothing made so clear to the trade unionists the changed situation since
the War ended as the strike of the bituminous coal miners which began
November 1. The miners had entered, in October 1917, into a wage
agreement with the operators for the duration of the War. The purchasing
power of their wages having become greatly reduced by the ever rising
cost of living, discontent was general in the union. A further
complication arose from the uncertain position of the United States with
reference to War and Peace, which had a bearing on the situation. The
miners claimed that the Armistice had ended the War. The War having
ended, the disadvantageous agreement expired with it. So argued the
miners and demanded a sixty percent increase in tonnage rates, a
corresponding one for yardmen and others paid by the day or hour, and a
thirty-hour week to spread employment through the year. The operators
maintained that the agreement was still in force, but intimated a
readiness to make concessions if they were permitted to shift the cost
to the consumer. At this point, the Fuel Administration, a War-time
government body, already partly in the process of dissolution,
intervened and attempted to dictate a settlement a