their demands for fair wages or better working conditions, turns against
them and supports the employer, greatly adding to his moral standing and
weakening that of the strikers, until the strikers, feeling that the
forces against them are too great, are apt to give way. The employer
will find the same negative reaction among the public if he tries to use
violence in order to break the strike. Hence, if he does decide to use
violence, he tries to make it appear that the strikers are responsible,
or tries to induce them to use it first. It is to their advantage not to
use it, even when it is used against them. Labor leaders in general
understand this principle and try to avoid violence at all costs. They
do so not on the basis of principle, but on the basis of expediency.[39]

In the great wave of enthusiastic organization of labor that swept over
the United States in 1936 and 1937, American labor copied a variant of
the strike, which had been used earlier in Hungary and in France.[40]
Instead of leaving the property of the employer and trying to prevent
others from entering it to take their places, workers remained on a "sit
down strike" within the plants, so that the employer would have been
forced to use violence to remove them in order to operate the factory.
These strikes were based in part upon the theory that the worker had a
property right to his job, just as the employer did to his capital
equipment. Such strikes were for a time more successful than the older
variety, because strike-breaking was virtually impossible. However, it
was not long before public opinion forced the abandonment of the
technique. It was revolutionary in character, since it threatened the
old concept of private property. The fear of small property holders that
their own possessions would be jeopardized by the success of such a
movement, made them support the owners of the plants against the
strikers, who were then forced to give way. In this case the public's
fear of revolutionary change was greater than their dislike of violence,