Labor Unions & Strikes t.s. – Explicitly assess information and draw

conclusions

OBJECTIVES:• Be able to differentiate amongst the

significant unions of the time period• Be able to cite chronology and significance

of the most important labor conflicts of the era

• Understanding of the factors that led to labor organization and strikes, and the implications for US history even to this day

Labor vs. Management

Tools of Labor Compromise Measures

Tools of Management

Boycott

Collective Bargaining

Closed shop

Union Shop

Violence

*Strike

Negotiation

Mediation

Binding Arbitration

Non-binding arbitration

Lockout

Blacklist

Yellow dog contract

Injunction

Strikebreakers

Police/Troops

Labor and Industry

• 14th amendment due process is interpreted as protecting corporations as a person

• Implications?

National Labor Union (NLU)

• William Sylvis

• Goals: 8 hr day, banking reform, end of convict labor, restrict immigration

• pro women

• pro African American (in separate groups)

• fades quickly by 1870

>1st large scale union movement in US<

Great RR Strike of 1877

• B & O Railroad; spreads throughout East and Midwest

• 2/3 of nations RRs idle

• President Hayes uses Federal Troops to break the strike

>>> Middle class concern of corporate abuse turns towards fear of mob violence<<<

Great Railroad Strike 1877

Knights of Labor• Founded 1869; led by Terrence

Powderly• a union for nearly ALL workers• goals: end child labor, graduated

income tax, cooperative ownership of production, immigration restrictions (ban Chinese)

• equal pay for women (10 % K of L)• >new sense of labor’s

possibilities<

Haymarket Riot, 1886• Police kill strikers at

McCormick Harvester plant• A bomb kills seven policemen

at a labor rally the next day• Police shoot and kill four

demonstrators• Four labor leaders executed as

a result• leads to split between K of L

and AFL>Increasing middle class fear of

mob; Unions perceived as “radical anarchists”<

American Federation of Labor (AFL)

• Formed in 1886 after Haymarket Riot; • Did not want to be associated with

“radicals”• Samuel Gompers• skilled workers ONLY• “bread and butter” unionism focused on

practical (not idealized) goals• 8 hr day, safety laws, higher wages• 1.6 million by 1904; most successful

American Railway Union

• Eugene V. Debs– ran for President 5 times– jailed several times for encouraging anti-

government actions

• All for one, one for all ideology• radical socialism as goal

– workers control the means of productionPULLMAN STRIKE (1894)

Pullman Strike, 1894

• Factory (company) town of Pullman, Ill.

• Worker wages cut; rent not reduced• workers join ARU; strike• rail traffic halted as workers refuse

to move Pullman Palace cars down the line

• Pres. Cleveland calls Federal troops to ensure “mail delivery”

>labor increasingly associated with violence, radicalism, anarchy<

Homestead Steel Strike, 1892

• Carnegie & Frick seek to crush the union

• Frick locks workers out, calls in Pinkerton guards

• Both Pinkertons and strikers killed • Carnegie, remorseful, builds a library

(Thanks!)

>>>The plant reopens with cheaper labor, yellow dog contracts, blacklists<<<

Women in the Union Movement• 1910: Women = 21% of

labor force• Mary “Mother” Jones

organized miner’s wives when strikes occurred

• Pauline Newman and Ladies Garment Workers Union

• 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Fire

Shortcomings of Labor Movement

• Splits between Labor factions:– Skilled vs. Unskilled labor– racial animosity– Gender and ethnic tensions (huge # of immigrants)– tactical differences – to strike or not to strike?

>>Never more than 5 % of entire workforce<<

-Perceptions of organized labor as radical taint union efforts and effectiveness

Philosophies of the WorkersEdward Bellamy - Looking Backward

-visions of a future utopian

Karl Marx - Das Kapital, Communist Manifesto

proletariat (workers) vs. bourgeoisie (capitalists)

classless utopian socialism

“to each according to his needs”

Govt. reg. /control of economy

Concluding Discussion1. Why did workers feel compelled to form unions during the nineteenth

century? Why not earlier? 2. How “American” are unions?

• What American values do they challenge? – Do they violate the American belief in individuality?

• What American values do they represent? – Are unions just trying to bring Americans democratic

philosophies into the workplace? – Or are they based on a collectivist idea that is foreign to

American ways of thinking?

3. To what extent are labor and working conditions still major issues in America today?

THE END