There was some agitation in New York City in the summer of 1906 to organize that section on a basis of one local union to each industry, with each local divided into sub-branches as the needs and extent of its constituency might require. These latter sub-branches were, moreover, to have no direct connection with the General Organization. This plan was opposed at the convention. It was in conflict with the policy of centralization which characterized the earlier stages of I. W. W. development. It was emphatically condemned by President Sherman as a violation of the constitution. He asserted that it centered the "power of the whole industry in the hands of the members of one local union."[273]
Centralization was wanted--but it was _national_ (or international) centralization, not district centralization. A provision had been made the year before for what were called "mixed locals" which were to include workers in various industries, but only so to include them temporarily; it being understood that so soon as a sufficient number of the workers in any particular industry came into the locality to warrant their organization into a union that all members of the mixed local who belonged to that industry should immediately withdraw from the "mixed" and join the "pure" industrial union. It was, of course, assumed that no one should join a mixed local or remain in a mixed local when a union of his industry existed in that locality. The privilege of membership in the mixed locals had already been very much abused. In numerous instances it was found that members continued as members of the mixed local, even after their particular industrial union had been organized, or even maintained membership in both the mixed and the industrial body at the same time. This double membership was not only of no value--it was usually positively disastrous. It made confusion and brought on factional fights between "mixed" and industrial bodies,[274] and resulted in a double, and consequently inflated, membership representation at the annual conventions. After an extended discussion of the seemingly unmixed evils of mixed "locals," the convention passed a resolution defining their functions. "The mixed local," runs the resolution, "is not to be a permanent institution in the I. W. W. It is merely the propaganda [body] that will build up an industrial union for the future. It is a recruiting station [only]."[275]