the trade unions received a
brilliant test during the hard times following the financial panic of
October 1907, when they successfully fought wage reductions. As good a
test is found in the conquest of the shorter day. By 1900 the eight-hour
day was the rule in the building trades, in granite cutting and in
bituminous coal mining. The most spectacular and costly eight-hour fight
was waged by the printers. In the later eighties and early nineties, the
Typographical Union had endeavored to establish a nine-hour day in the
printing offices. This was given a setback by the introduction of the
linotype machine during the period of depression, 1893-1897. In spite of
this obstacle, however, the Typographical Union held its ground.
Adopting the policy that only journeymen printers must operate the
linotype machines, the union was able to meet the situation. And,
furthermore, in 1898, through agreement with the United Typothetae of
America, the national association of employers in book and job printing,
the union was able to gain the nine-hour day in substantially all book
and job offices. In 1903 the union demanded the eight-hour day in all
printing offices to become effective January 1, 1906. To gain an
advantage over the union, the United Typothetae, late in the summer of
1905, locked out all its union men. This at once precipitated a strike
for the eight-hour day. The American Federation of Labor levied a
special assessment on all its members in aid of the strikers. By 1907
the Typographical Union won its demand all along the line, although at a
tremendous cost of money running into several million dollars, and in
1909 the United Typothetae formally conceded the eight-hour day.

Another proof of trade union progress is found in the spread of trade
agreements. The idea of a joint partnership of organized labor and
organized capital in the management of industry, which, ever since the
fifties, had been struggling for acceptance, finally showed definite
signs of coming to be materialized.

(1) _The Miners_

In no other industry has a union's struggle for "recognition" offered a
richer and more instructive picture of the birth of the new order with
its difficulties as well as its promises than in coal mining. Faced in
the anthracite field[50] by a small and well knitted group of employers,
generally considered a "trust," and by a no less difficult situation in
bituminous mining due to cut-throat competition among the mine