74 ChaPter 2
could not be applied to labor strikes, eliminating a favorite tactic of bosses who
would sue unions who went on strike and courts which, illogically, treated
unions the same as it did corporations. As a result labor unions could now
organize without being accused of price fixing or violating antitrust laws. But
Clayton did little to aid labor; it did not help workers organize unions, get bet-
ter wages, or improve work conditions. The Supreme Court declared illegal the
parts of the act that offered rights and relief to unions. Labor was little better
off than it had been before, and unions, like cornered animals, often fought back.
While Gompers and the AFL continued to support the Democratic Party
and Wilson, other workers became more radical, joining socialist or anarchist
unions, the best-known of which was the Industrial Workers of the World, or the
IWW, nicknamed “The Wobblies.” The IWW began in 1905 and was espe-
cially strong among miners and lumberjacks in the western states. Its goal
was to abolish capitalism and wage labor and establish a system of “workers’
self-management.” This was based on the idea of Anarcho-Syndicalism, which
held that workers should engage in direct action at the point of production—
taking over the factories, mines, lumber fields and running them coopera-
tively. There would be no division between bosses and workers and all would
share in the decision-making and profits of the operation. The Wobblies were
never a large union but Americans knew much about them. The IWW
singer Joe Hill, like Bob Dylan or Bruce Springsteen in later decades, achieved
fame as he wrote about Capitalism, revolution, and even religion. His song
“The Preacher and the Slave” attacked ministers who warned their flock not
to join unions, but instead told them to endure suffering on earth in the fac-
tories and fields because “you’ll get pie in the sky when you die.” Not sur-
prisingly, the government and economic leaders hated and feared the IWW.
The national government used Department of Justice agents [the Federal
Bureau of Investigation, or FBI, had not been created yet] and states sent local
police to harass, intimidate, attack, and arrest the Wobblies. The lumber camps
and mines of the west often resembled mini-war zones, with militias and pri-
vate corporate armies trading gunshot with IWW members. By the time
World War I came around, with a zealous campaign against “radicals,” the
IWW was exhausted from the various attacks against it. Again the state had
asserted its power against working people.
However, the AFL supported Wilson, who was criticized by Republicans
for being “pro-labor.” As he sought re-election in 1916, Wilson sought work-