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THE RISE of the AMALGAMATED WORKERS' ASSOCIATION Dr. K.H

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THE RISE of the AMALGAMATED WORKERS' ASSOCIATION Dr. K.H THE RISE OF THE AMALGAMATED WORKERS' ASSOCIATION Dr. K.H. Kennedy In the decade prior to the First World War, the trade union movement, the institutional means by which wage-labourers transform themselves into active elements in society, and the Labour Party, the political body of organized wage-labourers, gained new impetus and authority in Queensland politics. The Amalgamated Workers' Association, although remaining an autonomoios union before merging into the Australian Workers' Union in 1913, had a most significant and far-reaching impact on the development of trade union alignments, and on the direction of the Labour Party in this period. From a small miners' union founded in 1907, the A.W.A. had become one of the most influential organizations in the country within six years. The mineral boom on the Chillagoe, Walsh and Etheridge fields at the turn of the century induced new socio-economic conditions in Far North Queensland. The new towns of Chillagoe, Mungana, Zillmanton, Etheridge, Redcap, O.K., Einasleigh, Nymbool, Stannary Hills and Cardross had that raw edge of impermanency, characterised by hessian and iron architecture; and crude living conditions, as illustrated by Bolton: Poor sanitation still caused outbreaks of typhoid, and the water supply was heavily impregnated with lime - "but", shrugged one observer, "Chillagoe-ites don't drink water as a rxile."^ These were bawdy, brawling townships that owed their reputation as much to the potency of the liquor and to the excitement of the gambling schools, as to the wealth won from the mines. Railway navvies, miners and smelter hands stormed the many hotels on pay nights to drown their grievances with adulterated spirits and to mix with fellow workers at the "two-up" games, 2 which often climaxed in stand-up fights and brawls. However, such social behaviour was defensible as symptomatic of the general working conditions of the wages-men: long hours, moderate wages, a high cost of living combined with a lack of safety regulations, hi^ temperatures, poor ventilation and the ever present threat of dust and damp in the mines, clearly gave rise to rankling discontent and increasing conflict between management and labour. But for the "wages-men", there was little recourse to lanionism. A number of embryonic unions with a single work-site base had been formed, only to wither through apathy. A Miners' 189 K.H. KENNEDY and Smelters' Union was laimched at Chillagoe in I906, but attempts to promote branches at Mungana and Redcap had failed for several reasons: partly, it had displayed little initiative in improving the lot of its members; partly, the opposition of the powerful mining companies, controlling both communications and job opportunities, ensured that activists were discouraged. More important, it was, as Young points out, the attitudes of the workers themselves which impeded unionism: Attempts had been made to organise the workers, but rugged individualism, a capacity for endurance, frequent movement of people and, above all, a lack of knowledge of trade union techniques made corporate action difficult.3 In April-May 1907, unco-ordinated strikes at the Vulcan mine near Irvinebank failed for want of industrial organization. At the same time, mine managers throughout the Far North proposed wage cuts to maintain It company profits. It was not unexpected in view of this action and the workers' past experiences when a number of determined miners met at Irvinebank in September 1907 to launch the Amalgamated Workers' Association. Much of the credit for the union's early success belongs to E.G. Theodore, and to a lesser extent W. McCormack. Son of an Adelaide tugboat operator and grandson of a Rumanian Arch-bishop, Edward Granville Theodore was a bellicose young man of twenty-two, who had been accustomed to industrial protection at Broken Hill before arriving in North Queensland. He had the distinct advantage of iinion experience, and was widely read in socialist literature. His colleague, and five years his senior, was William McCormack, St. Lawrence bom with previous experience in mining at Mt. Morgan, but now employed at Stannary Hills. On forming a close friendship in I906, their careers became intertwined over the next twenty- five years: both were trade union officials. Labour politicians. Cabinet Ministers and, at different intervals. Premiers of Queensland. Despite their public association with Labour politics, it was the strong bond of friendship which still puzzled observers as late as 1931: What attracted one to the other it is very difficult to say, for Edward was the very antithesis of William. They were both big men physically and both clever men in a different sense, but while Theodore was abnormally sphinxlike, McCormack resembled more nearly the irrepressible but clever parrot who was proud of airing his knowledge of a foreign language.5 190 THE RISE OF THE AMALGAMATED WORKERS' ASSOCIATION Notwithstanding, they succeeded in moulding a "fighting machine" under the direction of a small executive, unsurpassed in the Queensland industrial movement before the First World War. Operating from Irvinebank as a f\ill-time organizer, Theodore spent the following months recruiting members, and by May I908, had established A.W.A. branches at Stannary Hills, Mungana, Herberton, O.K. and Irvinebank. Members were not always recruited by the organizer's expounding of the benefits of corporate action, for as Bolton puts it: ... some non-members were persuaded to join after a stand-up fight, others after losing their money to Theodore at two-up. One miner at Irvinebank who refused to strike found himself followed home from work every afternoon by a group of unionists whistling the 'Dead March' from Saul." By July 1908, it was clear that the A.W.A.'s energetic executive was determined to secure a politico-industrial base, encompassing all shades of working class opinion and all unskilled and semi-skilled workers in the region. McCormack, now general secretary of the A.W.A., sought to register the union with the Australian Labour Federation, and more importantly, with the Central Political Executive of the Labour Party to afford it recognition •7 as "the leading political Labour body in Woothakata". The defection of Mick Woods, the former Labour member, to the Kidston-Liberal coalition had caused widespread resentment among the miners. Shrewdly, McCormack not only aligned the A.W.A. with the mainstream of unionism in the State, but also now encompassed nearly all Labour sympathizers in the region under its influence and authority. To affirm the ascendancy of the union, Theodore and McCormack urged intervention in the Etheridge railway dispute: the executive declared support for the navvies, and voted them financial assistance; while Theodore enrolled the strikers in the A.W.A., and set up strike camps, maintained for three months by compulsory levies on union members at work. By September I908, there seemed little hope of a settlement, until Theodore, using his trump-card, enlisted the support of the Opposition Leader, David Bowman, and the prominent Labour spokesman, Albert Hinchcliffe, to negotiate with the government and the Chillagoe Company. The move was successful; and on 25 September 1908, a jubilant McCormack announced that the demands on pay and conditions had been met in full. This unprecedented victory over the management of the largest company in the North had immediate 191 K.H. KENNEDY repercussions for the union: not only did it precipitate an influx of new members, and the founding of new branches at Chillagoe, Einasleigh and Etheridge, but it confirmed the union's permanency as an effective 9 industrial body. Still eager to expand A.W.A. activities, McCormack scheduled the inaugural conference at Chillagoe for February 1909, to adopt a constitution and rules and a manifesto outlining the union's aims, which had been prepared by the executive. The original draft constitution was adopted by delegates from eleven branches without significant amendment, along with an elaborate set of riiles numbering over seventy. The principal feature was the centralization of control: all effective power was vested in the executive, which could suspend any riole or policy between conferences, and which was to direct all strikes, endorse all industrial agreements and supervise the union's finances. The branches were required to appoint delegates to conference and to the executive, collect membership 11 subscriptions and levies, and implement executive decisions. Significantly, the constitution and rules were concerned almost exclusively with organization, not aims, with means, rather than ends. This determined pragmatism which was to characterise the A.W.A. under the domination of Theodore and McCormack, was unusual at that time when most unions throughout Australia professed aims of a strongly Utopian character. Even Rule 21 concerning political activities was no exception, empowering the executive to conduct plebiscites in conjunction with W.P.O.'s "for the selection of parliamentary candidates to run in the interests of Labour." 12 The same hard-headed realism and concentration on practicable ends to the exclusion of rhetorical ideals dominated the objectives, which dealt with conditions of work and catered to the parochial interests of the members. Perhaps the most important decisions of the conference in the short term related to the union secretariat: firstly, the general secretary was afforded full-time status at a salary of 200 pounds per ann\mi to ensure that he was "beyond the reach of victimizing mine managers"; and secondly, the union's headquarters were transferred to Chillagoe, a more central location with telegraph and rail communications with Cairns. An office was established in what is now Theodore Avenue, at the base of a huge limestone outcrop, centrally situated between the railway station, the smelters and Byrne's Imperial Hotel. 192 THE RISE OF THE AMALGAMATED WORKERS' ASSOCIATION Other significant decisions included resolutions to fight all cases of victimization, designed to encourage membership; and the admission of sugar workers at Nelson and Mossman, foreshadowing rapid expansion into all 13 sugar growing areas.
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