Petition to the Government
The Petition to the Government, as this document is called, details the need of the mine workers in Ironforge for a laborers guild. It was posted to the doors of City Hall and signed by fifty miners.
Historical Details
History
As a city dependent on the mining industry for a majority of its income and employment, Ironforge is highly dependent on the physical labor of its miners. The conditions in which these miners work are dangerous, and the labor is grueling. However, for a very long time, miners were not given fair compensation for the risks and injuries they took on for this vital job. Many would be killed or hurt if mining tunnels collapsed, or could suffocate if pockets of bad air were exposed. But those injured were not given pay for time spent recovering, nor were the families of miners compensated if their loved one died while working. Miners were considered to be low-class, uneducated laborers who chose the job because they had no drive to search for anything better.
All this changed after the Petition was posted. Miners had long whispered of organizing a miners' guild, but it was difficult to find any kind of power to hold over their employers' heads. Finally, however, a group of miners had had enough of the poor pay, long hours, and lack of compensation for injuries, and drafted a letter to post on the doors of City Hall. It detailed the miners' demands and notified the government that, effective the very same morning, the miners would be going on strike. And strike they did, refusing to work until their demands were met. Ironforge ground to a halt, the sudden lack of mined materials causing one part of the industry after another to shut down until the miners came off strike. The entire city began to clamor for an end to the strike, whether by forcing the miners to resume work or by agreeing to their terms. After twenty-five days of strikes and negotiations, the owners of each mining company finally agreed to the terms of the miners, and the Miners' Guild was formed to protect this agreement and its members.
Public Reaction
Most of the working-class folk of Ironforge were in support of the Petition. They had seen other industries, like the jewelers and the clothmakers, successfully create guilds to protect the rights of the workers. The miners were part of them, as a huge portion of working-class folk either worked in the mines themselves or knew someone who did. As the strikes continued, many of these folk joined the miners, calling for the mining companies to agree to the terms and let a guild be created.
The middle- and upper-class folk had mixed reactions to the Petition, mostly influenced by their own backgrounds. Those who had once been members of the working class showed their support, as they believed that safe and fair labor, even for the lower classes, were fundamental rights for citizens of Ironforge. It was a city built on the labor of the miners, and they owed it to those same miners to give their fair compensation for all the burden they took on. On the other hand, many families who came from old money, especially those in the upper layers of society, believed that it was silly to support the miners' strike. The miners, some said, should simply quiet down and accept that these risks were part of the job, and that they chose to work in conditions that posed risks to them. If they had wanted to work in a safer industry, they should have simply trained for a different job. Others worried that the union would end up costing them more in the long run, that higher wages for miners would only make everything else more expensive.
Legacy
The Petition now sits in a display case in the entrance to Ironforge's City Hall. It is free to view, and many miners' families will come to read the document, to see this bit of history for themselves. The contents of the document helped to forge an influential guild for the miners, and to create a precedent of treating labor professions with respect. There are dozens of guilds in the present day in Ironforge, many of which were only formed after the Miners' Guild had been well-established.
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