eir purposes is shown by the referendum of 1911, by which they sought
to nationalize the State laws on the subject. At the time of the
railroad strike in Victoria, Australia, in 1903, a law was passed which
imposed a penalty of "twelve months' imprisonment or a fine of one
hundred pounds" for engaging in a strike on government railways, and
made a man liable to arrest without warrant or bail "for advising a
strike orally or by publication, or for attending any meetings of more
than six persons for the purpose of encouraging strikers." Even then the
limit had not been reached. In 1909 the Parliament of New South Wales
passed an act especially directed against strikes in any industry which
produced "the necessary commodities of life [these being defined as
coal, gas, water, and food] the privation of which may tend to endanger
human life or cause serious bodily injury," and the penalty of twelve
months' imprisonment of the Victorian law was extended to all this vast
group of industries also. The law of New South Wales was most stringent,
providing that any one taking part in a strike meeting under these
circumstances is also liable to twelve months' imprisonment, and that
the police may break into the headquarters of any union and seize any
documents "which they reasonably suspect to relate to any walk-out or
strike." Under this law the well-known labor leader, Peter Bowling, was
sentenced to one year of imprisonment.

The unions violently denounced this enactment, but chiefly as they had
denounced previous legislation, on the ground that it permitted
_unorganized_ workmen to apply for relief under the law. That is to say,
while the employers were using the law to make striking a crime, they
were extending such benefits as it produced to the nonunion workers who
can often be used as tools for their purposes. But the astounding hold
that "State Socialism" has on the Australian masses, especially on the
working people, is shown by the steadfast belief that this measure can
be amended so as to operate to their interest. Bowling and his unions
made a serious agitation for the general strike against the coercive
measure just mentioned, but it was only by a tie vote that the New South
Wales Labour Congress even favored protest in the form of cancelling the
agreement which the unions had made under the Industrial Disputes Acts,
while in the next elections New South Wales returned a majority of labor
representatives opposing Bowli