The Effects of the 1914 Ludlow Coal Strike on Unionization in the U.S.

Ludlow Coal Miners' Strike in Colorado

Today, workers in the United States take a number of things for granted, including state and federal employment laws, a 40-hour workweek, paid holidays, sick leave, vacation time and retirement plans, among numerous others, and few Americans would be willing to work at arduous and dangerous jobs for free. The situation in 1914 was dramatically different, though, and Americans workers today can credit the heroic Colorado coal miners who took up arms to protect their families and their livelihoods during the most violent labor uprising in the nation’s history. Indeed, at least 25 people, including 11 of the coal miners’ children, were killed in the ensuing Ludlow massacre on April 20, 1914 and far more are believed to have died during the duration of the 15-month strike. The purpose of this paper is to provide a description of the events that led up to the 1914 Ludlow miners’ strike, what took place during the uprising and the implications of this event on the nation’s labor relations. Following this review, the paper provides a summary of the research and important findings concerning the uprising in the conclusion.

Review and Discussion

The beginning of the 20th century came hard on the heels of the Gilded Age when America’s labor force increased dramatically and businesses began to consolidate into major concerns that wielded substantial political and economic clout. As the number of workers increased while the number of employers decreased, there was a growing recognition among labor that they lacked a real voice in their employment arrangements and were rather at the mercy of Big Business. In this regard, Burt (2011) reports that, “As more and more laborers worked for fewer and fewer companies and as individual workers in the capitalist economic system lost the ability to negotiate directly with their employer, they began to organize in the hope that in numbers they might find a voice” (p. 62).

In reality, the coal miners at Ludlow needed a very loud voice indeed in view of their hazardous working conditions and parsimonious pay arrangements. Hundreds of coal miners died each year due to the working conditions and the dangers included not only cave-ins but also explosions from the accumulated coal dust that also caused black lung disease among the miners. Further, the coal miners were only paid for the amount of coal they dug each day, and the employee who weighed it was assigned by the company and was believed to routinely cheat the workers. Not only were the miners cheated out of their fair wages in this fashion, they were also forced to dig the tunnels using pick and shovels as well as explosives, reinforce them with wooden bracings and lay railroad tracks without being paid for these services since they did not result in the extraction of any coal. In fact, miners could work at these tasks all week and never make a dime.

In addition, the miners were paid in script which was only redeemable at the company store. In many cases, miners would work all month and end up owing money after paying for their explosives, the company rent for their meager housing and settling their company store bill. Miners were also forced to live in barbed-wire enclosed camps that were patrolled by company guards and to purchase their own explosives that were used for tunneling and coal extraction -- and workers’ compensation was a thing of the distant future. In other words, the situation was ripe for trouble and that is exactly what the coal mine owners received in the spring of 1914 when the miners felt they had endured enough at the hands of their slavish employer (Green & Jameson, 2009).

With their very survival at stake and feeling they had no other viable options, in September 1913, the coal miners joined the United Mine Workers of America union and staged a walk-out strike to demand the removal of the camp guards, that the mine owner comply with state employment laws, the recognition of their newly founded union charter and better working conditions and payment arrangements. In response, the company attempted to restore order and return the miners to work using a private militia comprised of the local sheriff, camp guards, mercenaries, and detectives from the Baldwin-Felts Agency (Burt, 2011). When this intervention failed, the National Guard was deployed to reestablish order at the mine and return it to production.

The outcome of the intervention by the National Guard just added more fuel to the already red-hot after the miners were treated ever more harshly. For instance, Burt (2011) emphasizes that, “Union leaders and speakers, including Mother Jones, were harassed, arrested, and deported from the state. The miners’ weapons were confiscated and they were forbidden from congregating and speaking publicly in support of the union” (p. 64). At the time, the coal mine was owned by the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company (CF&I) which was controlled by John D. Rockefeller who would later testify before the federal Commission on Industrial Relations that he tried his best to be “fair” with the miners (Burt, 2011). According to an account of the uprising by one historian, “Once the walkout began, the CF&I evicted the striking miners and their families from their shacks on company land” (Burt, 2011, p. 63).

As a result, approximately 13,000 men, women and children were forcibly relocated to a tent city provided by the United Mine Workers onto an open field with no utilities or other resources. Consequently, the miners continued to refuse to return to work and aggressively sought to prevent non-union mines from taking their place. Moreover, 25 members of the United Mine Workers were indicted by a federal grand jury for “maintaining a monopoly of labor” and “conspiring in the restraint of trade,” but no charges were filed against the mine owners or operators (Burt, 2011).

Over the course of 10 days beginning on April 20, 1914, the miners would actively fight the National Guard and company-sponsored private militia in what would become known as the “Ludlow massacre” (In the hot seat, 2022). The massacre was triggered by the murder of Louis Tikas, a union organizer, who attempted to settle the matter peacefully but was assaulted, tortured and killed by a company executive (Foster, 1984). The Ludlow massacre was a brutal, bloody and criminal affair that involved the National Guard actually opening fire with machine guns, shooting indiscriminately at the miners’ tent city which they then torched for good measure. Women and children who tried to escape the flames were shot dead by the National Guard, and several members of one family died when their burning tent collapsed on a shallow cellar. The strike and uprising finally ended when President Woodrow Wilson agreed to dispatch more than 1,600 federal troops to “restore the peace” (as cited in Burt, 2011, p. 66). As a result of this strike, nationwide support for unions gained momentum and helped labor achieve a more equitable deal for their membership.