Metal and machinery 11 10 Food stuffs (Bakers) 2 2 Recruiting locals 13 8 Tobacco 1 Building 4 4 Shoe 1 1 Public Service 8 4 Clothing 3 3 Furniture 1 Mining (coal) 4 Transportation 7 2 Smelting 1 Lumber 9 4 Farming 2 2 Car building 2 4 Steel 1 4 ------------- 70 48 Secretary-Treasurer St. John presented an interesting classification of the reasons given for the disbanding of these forty-eight local unions. He distributes them as follows: Disrupted by lack of interest 22 Disrupted by strike 6 Disrupted by other organizations 6 Work closing down 5 Disrupted by members leaving locality 2 Incompetent secretary 2 Disrupted by internal dissension 1 Members left for Mexico 1 No record 3 --- 48[530] It was at this meeting that the question of the authority of the general administration over the rank and file was first seriously considered in the I. W. W. A number of constitutional changes were proposed and most of them were brought forward with the more or less definite idea of minimizing, or at least modifying in some way, the authority of the national officers and the other members or the General Executive Board. These amendments originated chiefly from local unions in the Rocky Mountain and Pacific States. The debates lasted several days and involved a rather thorough discussion of the relations between the different parts of the organization. All of these proposed amendments were lost, the delegates being of the opinion probably that few constitutional changes were necessary.[531]