The Big Strike

excerpt: Employers flatly turned down the demands outlined by the rank and-file convention and entered into a long series of conferences with union officials. [...] While employers and union officials engaged in totally unproductive negotiations, the men on the docks proceeded with arrangements for the strike. In San Francisco they elected a rank-and-file strike committee of 25 men right off the docks, and similar preparations were afoot in other ports. Next to the employers the reactionary, salaried officials displayed more anxiety over the prospect of a walkout than anyone else. They consistently opposed it and made every effort to delay action. Lee Holman, president of the San Francisco local of the ILA, who later turned out to be a racketeer and was expelled from the union, was in continual conflict with the activities of the rank and file.