The strike dragged more or less wearily throughout the fall of 1919 and the early winter. Long before the end of the year it ceased to be an important factor in mill operations, and its final official calling off on January 10, 1920, was merely a formal procedure. Long before that date the whole country had realized that the labor leaders had over-played their hands and had met their Waterloo. To all intents and purposes the steel strike was ended before the middle of November.
As it proved, the method adopted by Judge Gary in fighting the strike was the best. It consisted principally of permitting the public every opportunity of judging all aspects of the case and of standing pat on the fairness of the steel companies in dealing with their men. Had the Judge yielded one iota to the demands of the labor organizers this would but have convinced the radical element in labor that they held the whip hand over capital and would have encouraged them to further excessive demands. Had the Judge, on the other hand, attempted to fight the strike by meeting violence with violence this would have alienated public sympathy. And in the final analysis public opinion is the most important factor in settling industrial disputes.
As an aftermath to the strike came the “investigation” by the Interchurch World Movement, an organization at the head of which were a number of bishops and other churchmen. A committee of this organization visited Pittsburgh and other points and presented a statement, but it was of a character entirely biassed against the Corporation, its members, in their investigation, having apparently given heed only to the arguments of Messrs. Foster and Fitzpatrick.
In the report of this committee stress is laid on the long working hours of the man in the steel mill, ignoring the fact that steel companies generally have made great effort to reduce the average of daily work and that only a comparatively small percentage of the men work twelve hours. Further, the committee attacked the Corporation on the question of wages which it declared to be below the sum required for American standards of living, its statements failing to harmonize with the findings of other obviously unprejudiced investigators including the Senate Committee on Education and Labor, which found otherwise.