TO PICKET THE INDIVIDUAL, NOT THE SHOP, IN FUTURE.
Labor Ward Club Organization Adopts French Revolution Methods—Non-unionists to Be Driven from Pillar to Post.
TO PICKET the individual, not the shop, is the new article in the creed of the labor movement in Chicago. It grows out of the labor ward club organization which is being pushed by R. G. Wall. It is that development which makes the new policy practicable. "Our system," said Mr. Wall yesterday at the headquarters of the Federation of Labor, "is the same that was perfected by the Jacobins and Cordeliers in the French Revolution. It is organization of the whole labor strength by wards. It concentrates in centers all the force and vote of the unions in Chicago. Now that the new vagrancy ordinance has gone into effect, picketing of the plants, buildings, or shops, will be doubly difficult. With the ward clubs flourishing, such picketing will be no longer necessary. We will picket the individual instead of the factory." "Suppose a foundry strike is on. The strikers send to each ward club the names of the non-unionists who are at work. The club investigates its own neighborhood, spots the 'scabs,' and reasons with them face to face and heart to heart. Each 'scab' will either be compelled to join the union or else quit the neighborhood." "Persuasion will not be a hard matter. Fifty cents for candy for the boys of the neighborhood will do the business. Point out to them the house of the 'scab.' That 'scab' will have a morning escort of yelling boys, and also an evening one. Then at school the 'scab's' children will have a time. The women will take up the cause as only women can. I guess the 'scab' will think he had better leave the neighborhood; but if he does move into another ward, he will but change to the bailiwick of another club." "The system of individual picketing will be much more effective than the crude methods now in vogue."—Chicago Inter-Ocean.