COAL STRIKE OFF

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 51, 24 November 1941, Page 7

COAL STRIKE OFF

Arbitration Proposal Accepted

MEN RESUME WORK (By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright.) (Received November 23, 10.30 p.m.) WASHINGTON, November 22. The United Mine Workers’ Association policy committee dramatically called off the coal strike and voted unanimously for accepting President Roosevelt’s suggestion for arbitration of the closed-shop

issue in captive mines. Mr. Lewis’s concurrence reversed his stand of Wednesday. “We accept in the public interest,” Mr. Lewis wrote the President. He told the Press that the mine workers accepted the President’s suggestion fully and without qualification. The decision of the arbitration board which President Roosevelt designated will be binding on both the owners and miners.

Within minutes after the arbitration agreement was announced, back to work telegrams and telephone calls flashed from the U.M.W.A. headquarters. Within an hour pickets left some mineheads. In Pittsburg miners started down into the mines on the night shift, and virtually full operation appeared probable on Sunday with full blast mining assured on Monday. Mr. Lewis said that with the miners returning to work and the controversy well on the road to a just settlement, the coal supply was assured till April 1, 1943, when the present Appalachan contract terminated.

Congressional leaders cheered the news, but a number stressed that the end of the strike did not deter the enactment of legislative labour controls.