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The labor history of the United States describes the history of
organized labor A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits (s ...
,
US labor law United States labor law sets the rights and duties for employees, labor unions, and employers in the United States. Labor law's basic aim is to remedy the "inequality of bargaining power" between employees and employers, especially employers "orga ...
, and more general history of working people, in the United States. Beginning in the 1930s, unions became important allies of the Democratic Party. The nature and power of organized labor is the outcome of historical tensions among counter-acting forces involving workplace rights, wages, working hours, political expression, labor laws, and other working conditions. Organized unions and their umbrella labor federations such as the
AFL–CIO The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO) is the largest federation of unions in the United States. It is made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 12 million ac ...
and citywide federations have competed, evolved, merged, and split against a backdrop of changing values and priorities, and periodic federal government intervention. In most industrial nations, the labor movement sponsored its own political parties, with the US as a conspicuous exception. Both major American parties vied for union votes, with the Democrats usually much more successful. Labor unions became a central element of the New Deal coalition that dominated national politics from the 1930s into the mid-1960s during the Fifth Party System. Liberal Republicans who supported unions in the Northeast lost power after 1964.Nicol C. Rae, ''The Decline and Fall of the Liberal Republicans: From 1952 to the Present'' (1989) In recent decades, an enduring alliance was formed between labor unions and the Democrats, whereas the Republican Party has become hostile to unions and collective bargaining rights. The history of organized labor has been a specialty of scholars since the 1890s, and has produced a large amount of scholarly literature focused on the structure of organized unions. In the 1960s, as
social history Social history, often called the new social history, is a field of history that looks at the lived experience of the past. In its "golden age" it was a major growth field in the 1960s and 1970s among scholars, and still is well represented in his ...
gained popularity, a new emphasis emerged on the history of workers, including unorganized workers, and with special regard to gender and race. This is called "the new labor history". Much scholarship has attempted to bring the social history perspectives into the study of organized labor. By most measures, the strength of organized labor has declined in the United States over recent decades.


Organized labor prior to 1900

The history of labor disputes in America substantially precedes the Revolutionary period. In 1636, for instance, there was a fishermen's strike on an island off the coast of
Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and nor ...
and in 1677 twelve carmen were fined for going on strike in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
.Commons, ii-iii However, most instances of labor unrest during the colonial period were temporary and isolated, and rarely resulted in the formation of permanent groups of laborers for negotiation purposes. Little legal recourse was available to those injured by the unrest, because strikes were not typically considered illegal. The only known case of criminal prosecution of workers in the colonial era occurred as a result of a carpenters' strike in
Savannah A savanna or savannah is a mixed woodland-grassland (i.e. grassy woodland) ecosystem characterised by the trees being sufficiently widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach the ground to ...
, Georgia, in 1746.


Legality and ''Hunt'' (1842)

By the beginning of the 19th century, after the revolution, little had changed. The career path for most
artisan An artisan (from french: artisan, it, artigiano) is a skilled craft worker who makes or creates material objects partly or entirely by hand. These objects may be functional or strictly decorative, for example furniture, decorative art ...
s still involved
apprenticeship Apprenticeship is a system for training a new generation of practitioners of a trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study (classroom work and reading). Apprenticeships can also enable practitioners to gain a ...
under a master, followed by moving into independent production.Tomlins, 111 However, over the course of the
Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
, this model rapidly changed, particularly in the major metropolitan areas. For instance, in
Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
in 1790, the vast majority of the 1,300 artisans in the city described themselves as "master workman". By 1815, journeymen workers without independent means of production had displaced these "masters" as the majority. By that time journeymen also outnumbered masters in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
and
Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Since ...
.Tomlins, 112 This shift occurred as a result of large-scale transatlantic and rural-urban migration. Migration into the coastal cities created a larger population of potential laborers, which in turn allowed controllers of capital to invest in labor-intensive enterprises on a larger scale. Craft workers found that these changes launched them into competition with each other to a degree that they had not experienced previously, which limited their opportunities and created substantial risks of downward mobility that had not existed prior to that time. These conditions led to the first
labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the la ...
combination cases in
America The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
. Over the first half of the 19th century, there are twenty-three known cases of
indictment An indictment ( ) is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that use the concept of felonies, the most serious criminal offence is a felony; jurisdictions that do not use the felonies concept often use that ...
and
prosecution A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the common law adversarial system or the Civil law (legal system), civil law inquisitorial system. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the ...
for criminal conspiracy, taking place in six states:
Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
,
Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean t ...
,
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...
,
Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is bord ...
,
Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...
, and
Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are ...
. The central question in these cases was invariably whether workmen in combination would be permitted to use their
collective bargaining Collective bargaining is a process of negotiation between employers and a group of employees aimed at agreements to regulate working salaries, working conditions, benefits, and other aspects of workers' compensation and rights for workers. The ...
power to obtain benefits—increased
wage A wage is payment made by an employer to an employee for work done in a specific period of time. Some examples of wage payments include compensatory payments such as ''minimum wage'', '' prevailing wage'', and ''yearly bonuses,'' and remune ...
s, decreased hours, or improved conditions—which were beyond their ability to obtain as individuals. The cases overwhelmingly resulted in convictions. However, in most instances the plaintiffs' desire was to establish favorable
precedent A precedent is a principle or rule established in a previous legal case that is either binding on or persuasive for a court or other tribunal when deciding subsequent cases with similar issues or facts. Common-law legal systems place great v ...
, not to impose harsh penalties, and the fines were typically modest. One of the central themes of the cases prior to the landmark decision in ''
Commonwealth v. Hunt ''Commonwealth v. Hunt'', 45 Mass. 111 (1842) was a case in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court on the subject of labor unions. Prior to ''Hunt'' the legality of labor combinations in America was uncertain. In March 1842, Chief Justice Lemue ...
'', which settled the legality of unions, was the applicability of the English
common law In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omniprese ...
in post-revolutionary America. Whether the English common law applied—and in particular whether the common law notion that a conspiracy to raise wages was illegal applied—was frequently the subject of debate between the defense and the prosecution.Tomlins, 133 For instance, in ''
Commonwealth v. Pullis ''Commonwealth v. Pullis'', 3 Doc. Hist. 59 (1806) was a US labor law case, and the first reported case arising from a labor strike in the United States. It decided that striking workers were illegal conspirators. Facts In 1794, Philadelphia shoem ...
'', a case in 1806 against a combination of journeymen cordwainers in Philadelphia for conspiracy to raise their wages, the defense attorneys referred to the common law as arbitrary and unknowable and instead praised the
legislature A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make laws for a political entity such as a country or city. They are often contrasted with the executive and judicial powers of government. Laws enacted by legislatures are usually known ...
as the embodiment of the democratic promise of the revolution.Lloyd, 107-24 In ruling that a combination to raise wages was ''per se'' illegal, Recorder Moses Levy strongly disagreed, writing that " e acts of the legislature form but a small part of that code from which the citizen is to learn his duties . . . is in the volumes of the common law we are to seek for information in the far greater number, as well as the most important causes that come before our tribunals." As a result of the spate of convictions against combinations of laborers, the typical
narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether nonfictional ( memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travelogue, etc.) or fictional ( fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller, novel, etc ...
of early American labor law states that, prior to ''Hunt'' in Massachusetts in 1842, peaceable combinations of workingmen to raise wages, shorten hours or ensure employment, were illegal in the United States, as they had been under English common law. In
England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...
, criminal conspiracy laws were first held to include combinations in restraint of trade in the Court of
Star Chamber The Star Chamber (Latin: ''Camera stellata'') was an English court that sat at the royal Palace of Westminster, from the late to the mid-17th century (c. 1641), and was composed of Privy Counsellors and common-law judges, to supplement the ju ...
early in the 17th century. The precedent was solidified in 1721 by '' R v Journeymen Tailors of Cambridge'', which found
tailor A tailor is a person who makes or alters clothing, particularly in men's clothing. The Oxford English Dictionary dates the term to the thirteenth century. History Although clothing construction goes back to prehistory, there is evidence of ...
s guilty of a conspiracy to raise wages.
Leonard Levy Leonard Williams Levy (April 9, 1923 – August 24, 2006) was an American historian, the Andrew W. Mellon All-Claremont Professor of Humanities and chairman of the Graduate Faculty of History at Claremont Graduate School, California, who speciali ...
went so far as to refer to ''Hunt'' as the "
Magna Carta (Medieval Latin for "Great Charter of Freedoms"), commonly called (also ''Magna Charta''; "Great Charter"), is a royal charter of rights agreed to by King John of England at Runnymede, near Windsor, on 15 June 1215. First drafted by t ...
of American trade-unionism",Levy, 183 illustrating its perceived standing as the major point of divergence in the American and English legal treatment of unions which, "removed the stigma of criminality from labor organizations". However, case law in America prior to ''Hunt'' was mixed. ''Pullis'' was actually unusual in strictly following the English
common law In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omniprese ...
and holding that a combination to raise
wage A wage is payment made by an employer to an employee for work done in a specific period of time. Some examples of wage payments include compensatory payments such as ''minimum wage'', '' prevailing wage'', and ''yearly bonuses,'' and remune ...
s was by itself illegal. More often combination cases prior to ''Hunt'' did not hold that unions were illegal ''per se'', but rather found some other justification for a
conviction In law, a conviction is the verdict reached by a court of law finding a defendant guilty of a crime. The opposite of a conviction is an acquittal (that is, "not guilty"). In Scotland, there can also be a verdict of " not proven", which is cons ...
.Witte, 825 After ''Pullis'' in 1806, eighteen other prosecutions of laborers for conspiracies followed within the next three decades. However, only one such case, ''People v. Fisher'', also held that a combination for the purpose of raising
wage A wage is payment made by an employer to an employee for work done in a specific period of time. Some examples of wage payments include compensatory payments such as ''minimum wage'', '' prevailing wage'', and ''yearly bonuses,'' and remune ...
s was illegal. Several other cases held that the methods used by the unions, rather than the unions themselves, were illegal. For instance, in ''People v. Melvin'', cordwainers were again convicted of a
conspiracy A conspiracy, also known as a plot, is a secret plan or agreement between persons (called conspirers or conspirators) for an unlawful or harmful purpose, such as murder or treason, especially with political motivation, while keeping their agr ...
to raise
wage A wage is payment made by an employer to an employee for work done in a specific period of time. Some examples of wage payments include compensatory payments such as ''minimum wage'', '' prevailing wage'', and ''yearly bonuses,'' and remune ...
s. Unlike in ''Pullis'', however, the court held that the combination's existence itself was not unlawful, but nevertheless reached a conviction because the
cordwainer A cordwainer () is a shoemaker who makes new shoes from new leather. The cordwainer's trade can be contrasted with the cobbler's trade, according to a tradition in Britain that restricted cobblers to repairing shoes. This usage distinction is ...
s had refused to work for any master who paid lower wages, or with any laborer who accepted lower wages than what the combination had stipulated. The court held that methods used to obtain higher wages would be unlawful if they were judged to be deleterious to the general welfare of the community.Tomlins, 139–147 ''Commonwealth v. Morrow'' continued to refine this standard, stating that, "an agreement of two or more to the
prejudice Prejudice can be an affective feeling towards a person based on their perceived group membership. The word is often used to refer to a preconceived (usually unfavourable) evaluation or classification of another person based on that person's per ...
of the rights of others or of society" would be illegal. Another line of cases, led by Justice John Gibson of the
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Unified Judicial System. It also claims to be the oldest appellate court in the United States, a claim that is disputed by the Massachusetts Supreme Ju ...
's decision in ''Commonwealth v. Carlisle'', held that
motive Motive(s) or The Motive(s) may refer to: * Motive (law) Film and television * ''Motives'' (film), a 2004 thriller * ''The Motive'' (film), 2017 * ''Motive'' (TV series), a 2013 Canadian TV series * ''The Motive'' (TV series), a 2020 Israeli T ...
of the combination, rather than simply its existence, was the key to illegality. Gibson wrote, "Where the act is lawful for an individual, it can be the subject of a conspiracy, when done in concert, only where there is a direct intention that injury shall result from it". Still other courts rejected ''Pullis'' rule of ''per se'' illegality in favor of a
rule Rule or ruling may refer to: Education * Royal University of Law and Economics (RULE), a university in Cambodia Human activity * The exercise of political or personal control by someone with authority or power * Business rule, a rule pert ...
that asked whether the combination was a but-for cause of
injury An injury is any physiological damage to living tissue caused by immediate physical stress. An injury can occur intentionally or unintentionally and may be caused by blunt trauma, penetrating trauma, burning, toxic exposure, asphyxiation, o ...
. Thus, as
economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...
Edwin Witte stated, "The doctrine that a combination to raise wages is illegal was allowed to die by common consent. No leading case was required for its overthrow". Nevertheless, while ''Hunt'' was not the first case to hold that labor combinations were legal, it was the first to do so explicitly and in clear terms.


Early federations

The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen — now part of the
International Brotherhood of Teamsters The International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT), also known as the Teamsters Union, is a labor union in the United States and Canada. Formed in 1903 by the merger of The Team Drivers International Union and The Teamsters National Union, the un ...
— was Founded May 8, 1863, at
Detroit, Michigan Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...
. The National Labor Union (NLU), founded in 1866, was the second national labor federation in the United States. It was dissolved in 1872. The regional Order of the Knights of St. Crispin was founded in the northeast in 1867 and claimed 50,000 members by 1870, by far the largest union in the country. A closely associated union of women, the Daughters of St. Crispin, formed in 1870. In 1879 the Knights formally admitted women, who by 1886 comprised 10 percent of the union's membership, but it was poorly organized and soon declined. They fought encroachments of machinery and unskilled labor on autonomy of skilled shoe workers. One provision in the Crispin constitution explicitly sought to limit the entry of "green hands" into the trade, but this failed because the new machines could be operated by semi-skilled workers and produce more shoes than hand sewing.


Railroad brotherhoods

With the rapid growth and consolidation of large railroad systems after 1870, union organizations sprang up, covering the entire nation. By 1901, 17 major railway brotherhoods were in operation; they generally worked amicably with management, which recognized their usefulness. Key unions included the
Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) is a labor union founded in Marshall, Michigan, on 8 May 1863 as the Brotherhood of the Footboard. It was the first permanent trade organization for railroad workers in the US. A year late ...
(BLE), Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Division (BMWED), the
Order of Railway Conductors The Order of Railway Conductors of America (ORC) was a labor union that represented train conductors in the United States. It has its origins in the Conductors Union founded in 1868. Later it extended membership to brakemen. In 1969 the ORC merg ...
, the
Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen The Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and Enginemen (B of LF&E) was a North American Rail transport, railroad fraternal benefit society and trade union in the 19th and 20th centuries. The organization began in 1873 as the Brotherhood of Locomotive ...
, and the
Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen The Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen (BRT) was a labor organization for railroad employees founded in 1883. Originally called the Brotherhood of Railroad Brakemen, its purpose was to negotiate contracts with railroad management and to provide in ...
. Their main goal was building insurance and medical packages for their members, as well as negotiating work rules, such as those involving seniority and grievance procedures. They were not members of the AFL, and fought off more radical rivals such as the
Knights of Labor Knights of Labor (K of L), officially Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor, was an American labor federation active in the late 19th century, especially the 1880s. It operated in the United States as well in Canada, and had chapters also ...
in the 1880s and the American Railroad Union in the 1890s. They consolidated their power in 1916, after threatening a national strike, by securing the Adamson Act, a federal law that provided 10 hours pay for an eight-hour day. At the end of World War I they promoted nationalization of the railroads, and conducted a national strike in 1919. Both programs failed, and the brotherhoods were largely stagnant in the 1920s. They generally were independent politically, but supported the third party campaign of Robert M. La Follette in 1924.


Knights of Labor

The first effective labor organization that was more than regional in membership and influence was the Knights of Labor, organized in 1869. The Knights believed in the unity of the interests of all producing groups and sought to enlist in their ranks not only all laborers but everyone who could be truly classified as a producer. The acceptance of all producers led to explosive growth after 1880. Under the leadership of Terence V. Powderly they championed a variety of causes, sometimes through political or
cooperative A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is "an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-contro ...
ventures. Powderly hoped to gain their ends through politics and education rather than through economic coercion. The Knights were especially successful in developing a working class culture, involving women, families, sports, and leisure activities and educational projects for the membership. The Knights strongly promoted their version of
republicanism Republicanism is a political ideology centered on citizenship in a state organized as a republic. Historically, it emphasises the idea of self-rule and ranges from the rule of a representative minority or oligarchy to popular sovereignty. ...
that stressed the centrality of free labor, preaching harmony and cooperation among producers, as opposed to parasites and speculators. One of the earliest railroad strikes was also one of the most successful. In 1885, the Knights of Labor led railroad workers to victory against
Jay Gould Jason Gould (; May 27, 1836 – December 2, 1892) was an American railroad magnate and financial speculator who is generally identified as one of the robber barons of the Gilded Age. His sharp and often unscrupulous business practices made him ...
and his entire Southwestern Railway system. In early 1886, the Knights were trying to coordinate 1,400 strikes involving over 600,000 workers spread over much of the country. The tempo had doubled over 1885, and involved peaceful as well as violent confrontations in many sectors, such as railroads, street railroads, and coal mining, with demands usually focused on the eight hour day. Suddenly, it all collapsed, largely because the Knights were unable to handle so much on their plate at once, and because they took a smashing blow in the aftermath of the Haymarket Riot in May 1886 in Chicago. The Haymarket Riot started as a strike organized by the Knights at the McCormick Reaper Factory in Chicago. Along with the McCormick strike, on May 1, 80,000 mostly immigrant workers led a general strike in Chicago, along with 340,000 workers in the rest of the United States. Attending the strike were a rising movement of armed
anarchists Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not necessari ...
formed as a result of the police violence of the
Great Railroad Strike of 1877 The Great Railroad Strike of 1877, sometimes referred to as the Great Upheaval, began on July 14 in Martinsburg, West Virginia, after the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) cut wages for the third time in a year. This strike finally ended 52 day ...
. While beginning relatively peacefully, police and strikers began to clash. As strikers rallied against the McCormick plant, a team of political anarchists, who were not Knights, tried to piggyback support among striking Knights workers. A bomb exploded as police were dispersing a peaceful rally, killing seven policemen and wounding many others. The anarchists were blamed, and their spectacular trial gained national attention. The Knights of Labor were seriously injured by the false accusation that the Knights promoted anarchistic violence. Many Knights locals transferred to the less radical and more respectable AFL unions or railroad brotherhoods.


American Federation of Labor

The
Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions of the United States and Canada (FOTLU) was a federation of labor unions created on November 15, 1881, at Turner Hall in Pittsburgh. It changed its name to the American Federation of Labor (AF ...
began in 1881 under the leadership of
Samuel Gompers Samuel Gompers (; January 27, 1850December 13, 1924) was a British-born American cigar maker, labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and served as the organization's ...
. Like the
National Labor Union The National Labor Union (NLU) is the first national labor federation in the United States. Founded in 1866 and dissolved in 1873, it paved the way for other organizations, such as the Knights of Labor and the AFL (American Federation of Labor) ...
, it was a federation of different unions and did not directly enroll workers. Its original goals were to encourage the formation of trade unions and to obtain legislation, such as prohibition of child labor, a national eight hour day, and exclusion of Chinese and other foreign contract workers. Strikes organized by labor unions became routine events by the 1880s. There were 37,000 strikes between 1881 and 1905. By far the largest number were in the building trades, followed far behind by coal miners. The main goal was control of working conditions, setting uniform wage scales, protesting the firing of a member, and settling which rival union was in control. Most strikes were of very short duration. In times of depression strikes were more violent but less successful, because the company was losing money anyway. They were successful in times of prosperity when the company was losing profits and wanted to settle quickly. The Federation made some efforts to obtain favorable legislation, but had little success in organizing or chartering new unions. It came out in support of the proposal, traditionally attributed to
Peter J. McGuire Peter J. McGuire (July 6, 1852 – February 18, 1906) was an American labor leader of the nineteenth century. He co-founded the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America in 1881 along with Gustav Luebkert and became one of the leading ...
of the Carpenters Union, for a national
Labor Day Labor Day is a federal holiday in the United States celebrated on the first Monday in September to honor and recognize the American labor movement and the works and contributions of laborers to the development and achievements of the United St ...
holiday on the first Monday in September. It also threw itself behind the eight hour movement, which sought to limit the workday by either legislation or union negotiation. In 1886, as the relations between the trade union movement and the Knights of Labor worsened, McGuire and other union leaders called for a convention to be held at Columbus, Ohio, on December 8. The
Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions of the United States and Canada (FOTLU) was a federation of labor unions created on November 15, 1881, at Turner Hall in Pittsburgh. It changed its name to the American Federation of Labor (AF ...
merged with the new organization, known as the American Federation of Labor or AFL, formed at that convention. The AFL was formed in large part because of the dissatisfaction of many trade union leaders with the Knights of Labor, an organization that contained many trade unions and that had played a leading role in some of the largest strikes of the era. The new AFL distinguished itself from the Knights by emphasizing the autonomy of each trade union affiliated with it and limiting membership to workers and organizations made up of workers, unlike the Knights which, because of its producerist focus, welcomed some who were not wage workers. The AFL grew steadily in the late 19th century while the Knights all but disappeared. Although Gompers at first advocated something like
industrial unionism Industrial unionism is a trade union organizing method through which all workers in the same industry are organized into the same union, regardless of skill or trade, thus giving workers in one industry, or in all industries, more leverage in ...
, he retreated from that in the face of opposition from the
craft unions Craft unionism refers to a model of trade unionism in which workers are organised based on the particular craft or trade in which they work. It contrasts with industrial unionism, in which all workers in the same industry are organized into the sa ...
that made up most of the AFL. The unions of the AFL were composed primarily of skilled men; unskilled workers, African-Americans, and women were generally excluded. The AFL saw women as threatening the jobs of men, since they often worked for lower wages. The AFL provided little to no support for women's attempts to unionize.


Western Federation of Miners

The Western Federation of Miners (WFM) was created in 1893. Frequently in competition with the American Federation of Labor, the WFM spawned new federations, including the Western Labor Union (later renamed to the
American Labor Union The American Labor Union (ALU) was a radical labor organization launched as the Western Labor Union (WLU) in 1898. The organization was established by the Western Federation of Miners (WFM) in an effort to build a federation of trade unions in th ...
). The WFM took a conservative turn in the aftermath of the Colorado Labor Wars and the trials of its president,
Charles Moyer Charles H. "Charlie" Moyer (1866 – June 2, 1929) was an American labor leader and president of the Western Federation of Miners (WFM) from 1902 to 1926. He led the union through the Colorado Labor Wars, was accused of murdering an ex-govern ...
, and its secretary treasurer,
Big Bill Haywood William Dudley "Big Bill" Haywood (February 4, 1869 – May 18, 1928) was an American labor organizer and founding member and leader of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and a member of the executive committee of the Socialist Party of ...
, for the conspiratorial assassination of Idaho's former governor. Although both were found innocent, the WFM, headed by Moyer, separated itself from the
Industrial Workers of the World The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), members of which are commonly termed "Wobblies", is an international labor union that was founded in Chicago in 1905. The origin of the nickname "Wobblies" is uncertain. IWW ideology combines general ...
(IWW) (launched by Haywood and other labor radicals, socialists, and anarchists in 1905) just a few years after that organization's founding convention. In 1916 the WFM became the
International Union of Mine, Mill, and Smelter Workers The International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers (IUMMSW) was a labor union representing miners and workers in related occupations in the United States and Canada. The union played an important role in the protection of workers and in de ...
, which was eventually absorbed by the
United Steelworkers of America The United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, commonly known as the United Steelworkers (USW), is a general trade union with members across North America. Headquar ...
.


Pullman Strike

During the major economic depression of the early 1890s, the
Pullman Palace Car Company The Pullman Company, founded by George Pullman, was a manufacturer of railroad cars in the mid-to-late 19th century through the first half of the 20th century, during the boom of railroads in the United States. Through rapid late-19th century ...
cut wages in its factories. Discontented workers joined the
American Railway Union The American Railway Union (ARU) was briefly among the largest labor unions of its time and one of the first industrial unions in the United States. Launched at a meeting held in Chicago in February 1893, the ARU won an early victory in a strike ...
(ARU), led by Eugene V. Debs, which supported their strike by launching a boycott of all Pullman cars on all railroads. ARU members across the nation refused to switch Pullman cars onto trains. When these switchmen were disciplined, the entire ARU struck the railroads on June 26, 1894. Within four days, 125,000 workers on twenty-nine railroads had people quit work rather than handle Pullman cars. Strikers and their supporters also engaged in riots and
sabotage Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening a polity, effort, or organization through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction. One who engages in sabotage is a ''saboteur''. Saboteurs typically try to conceal their identitie ...
.Ray Ginger, ''Eugene V. Debs'' (1962) p 170 The railroads were able to get Edwin Walker, general counsel for the Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Paul Railway, appointed as a special federal attorney with responsibility for dealing with the strike. Walker went to federal court and obtained an injunction barring union leaders from supporting the boycott in any way. The court injunction was based on the
Sherman Anti-Trust Act The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 (, ) is a United States antitrust law which prescribes the rule of free competition among those engaged in commerce. It was passed by Congress and is named for Senator John Sherman, its principal author. T ...
which prohibited "Every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce among the several States". Debs and other leaders of the ARU ignored the injunction, and federal troops were called into action. The strike was broken up by
United States Marshals The United States Marshals Service (USMS) is a federal law enforcement agency in the United States. The USMS is a bureau within the U.S. Department of Justice, operating under the direction of the Attorney General, but serves as the enforce ...
and some 2,000
United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, ...
troops, commanded by Nelson Miles, sent in by President
Grover Cleveland Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...
on the premise that the strike interfered with the delivery of
US Mail The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the U. ...
. During the course of the strike, 13 strikers were killed and 57 were wounded. An estimated $340,000 worth of property damage occurred during the strike. Debs went to prison for six months for violating the federal court order, and the ARU disintegrated.


Labor Exchanges and Tokens

Labor exchange notes are a rare
numismatic Numismatics is the study or collection of currency, including coins, tokens, paper money, medals and related objects. Specialists, known as numismatists, are often characterized as students or collectors of coins, but the discipline also incl ...
item. They were issued by many Labor Exchanges in the western United States during the 1890s due to difficult economic times and may have been connected to early labor union cooperatives. The notes represented an exchange of labor for goods or labor for labor. However, they were issued in limited numbers and only for a short period of time because the plan to expand the Labor exchange notes program did not meet expectations. Tokens and
medal A medal or medallion is a small portable artistic object, a thin disc, normally of metal, carrying a design, usually on both sides. They typically have a commemorative purpose of some kind, and many are presented as awards. They may be int ...
s were also used as propaganda for labor movements as early as the late 1800s. They were issued by local labor groups to members of their "temples" or made to commemorate important events, such as the Haymarket Massacre in Chicago. These tokens often featured popular labor union symbols like clasped hands or an
arm and hammer The arm and hammer is a symbol consisting of a muscular arm holding a hammer. Used in ancient times as a symbol of the god Vulcan, it came to be known as a symbol of industry, for example blacksmithing and gold-beating Gold leaf is gold ...
. Some tokens were industry specific, such as those issued by the Loyal League of Loggers and Lumbermen (LLLL), which depicted airplanes, trees, logs, ships, saws, and axes.


Organized labor, 1900–1920

Australian historian
Peter Shergold Peter Roger Shergold is an Australian academic, company director, and former public servant. Shergold was the Chancellor of Western Sydney University from 2011 through 2022. Between February 2003 and February 2008, he was the Secretary of the ...
confirms the findings of many scholars that the standard of living for US industrial workers was higher than in Europe. He compares wages and the standard of living in Pittsburgh with
Birmingham, England Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...
. He finds that, after taking into account the cost of living (which was 65 percent higher in the US), the standard of living of unskilled workers was about the same in the two cities, while skilled workers had about twice as high a standard of living. The American advantage grew over time from 1890 to 1914, and there was a heavy steady flow of skilled workers from Britain to industrial America. Shergold revealed that skilled Americans did earn higher wages than the British, yet unskilled workers did not, while Americans worked longer hours, with a greater chance of injury, and had fewer social services. American industry had the highest rate of accidents in the world. The US was also the only industrial power to have no workman's compensation program in place to support injured workers.Tindall, George Brown and Shi, David E. ''America: A Narrative History'' (Brief 9th ed. 2012) vol 2 p. 590 From 1860 to 1900, the wealthiest 2 percent of American households owned more than a third of the nation's wealth, while the top 10 percent owned roughly three-quarters of it. The bottom 40 percent had no wealth at all. In terms of property, the wealthiest 1 percent owned 51 percent, while the bottom 44 percent claimed 1.1 percent. Historian
Howard Zinn Howard Zinn (August 24, 1922January 27, 2010) was an American historian, playwright, philosopher, socialist thinker and World War II veteran. He was chair of the history and social sciences department at Spelman College, and a politica ...
argues that this disparity along with precarious working and living conditions for the working classes prompted the rise of
populist Populism refers to a range of political stances that emphasize the idea of "the people" and often juxtapose this group against " the elite". It is frequently associated with anti-establishment and anti-political sentiment. The term develop ...
,
anarchist Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not necessar ...
, and
socialist Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
movements. French economist
Thomas Piketty Thomas Piketty (; born 7 May 1971) is a French economist who is Professor of Economics at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences, Associate Chair at the Paris School of Economics and Centennial Professor of Economics in the In ...
notes that economists during this time, such as
Willford I. King Willford Isbell King (June 2, 1880 – October 17, 1962) was an American statistician, economist, and chairman of the Committee for Constitutional Government, Inc. Biography King was born in Cascade, Iowa on June 2, 1880. King received his edu ...
, were concerned that the United States was becoming increasingly inegalitarian to the point of becoming like old Europe, and "further and further away from its original pioneering ideal." Nationwide from 1890 to 1914 the unionized wages in manufacturing rose from $17.63 a week to $21.37, and the average work week fell from 54.4 to 48.8 hours a week. The pay for all factory workers was $11.94 and $15.84 because unions reached only the more skilled factory workers.


Coal strikes, 1900–1902

The United Mine Workers was successful in its strike against soft coal (bituminous) mines in the Midwest in 1900, but its strike against the hard coal (anthracite) mines of Pennsylvania turned into a national political crisis in 1902. President
Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
brokered a compromise solution that kept the flow of coal going, and higher wages and shorter hours, but did not include recognition of the union as a bargaining agent.


Women's Trade Union League

The
Women's Trade Union League The Women's Trade Union League (WTUL) (1903–1950) was a U.S. organization of both working class and more well-off women to support the efforts of women to organize labor unions and to eliminate sweatshop conditions. The WTUL played an importa ...
, formed in 1903, was the first labor organization dedicated to helping working women. It did not organize them into locals; its goal was to support the AFL and encourage more women to join labor unions. It was composed of both working women and middle-class reformers, and provided financial assistance, moral support, and training in work skills and social refinement for blue-collar women. Most active in 1907–1922 under
Margaret Dreier Robins Margaret Dreier Robins (6 September 1868 – 21 February 1945) was an American labor leader and philanthropist. Early life She was born in Brooklyn, New York on 6 September 1868. Her parents, Theodor Dreier, a successful businessman, and Dorthea D ...
, it publicized the cause and lobbied for minimum wages and restrictions on hours of work and child labor. Also under Dreier's leadership, they were able to pass crucial legislation for wage workers, and establish new safety regulations. In 1911, a fire broke out in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in
Manhattan, New York City Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of co ...
. Due to the lack of fire safety measures in the building, 146 primarily female workers were killed in the incident. This incident led to a movement to increase safety measures in factories. It also was an opportunity for the Women's Trade Union League to open conversation for the conditions of women's workplaces in the labor movement.


Industrial Workers of the World

The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), whose members became known as "Wobblies", was founded in Chicago in 1905 by a group of about 30 labor radicals. Their most prominent leader was William "Big Bill" Haywood. The IWW pioneered creative tactics, and organized along the lines of
industrial unionism Industrial unionism is a trade union organizing method through which all workers in the same industry are organized into the same union, regardless of skill or trade, thus giving workers in one industry, or in all industries, more leverage in ...
rather than craft unionism; in fact, they went even further, pursuing the goal of " One Big Union" and the abolition of the wage system. Many, though not all, Wobblies favored
anarcho-syndicalism Anarcho-syndicalism is a political philosophy and anarchist school of thought that views revolutionary industrial unionism or syndicalism as a method for workers in capitalist society to gain control of an economy and thus control influence in ...
. Much of the IWW's organizing took place in the West, and most of its early members were miners, lumbermen, cannery, and dock workers. In 1912 the IWW organized a strike of more than twenty thousand textile workers, and by 1917 the
Agricultural Workers Organization The Agricultural Workers Organization (AWO), later known as the Agricultural Workers Industrial Union, was an organization of farm workers throughout the United States and Canada formed on April 15, 1915, in Kansas City. It was supported by, a ...
(AWO) of the IWW claimed a hundred thousand itinerant farm workers in the heartland of North America. Eventually the concept of One Big Union spread from dock workers to maritime workers, and thus was communicated to many different parts of the world. Dedicated to
workplace A workplace is a location where someone works, for their employer or themselves, a place of employment. Such a place can range from a home office to a large office building or factory. For industrialized societies, the workplace is one of ...
and
economic democracy Economic democracy is a socioeconomic philosophy that proposes to shift decision-making power from corporate managers and corporate shareholders to a larger group of public stakeholders that includes workers, customers, suppliers, neighbou ...
, the IWW allowed men and women as members, and organized workers of all races and nationalities, without regard to current employment status. At its peak it had 150,000 members (with 200,000 membership cards issued between 1905 and 1916), but it was fiercely repressed during, and especially after, World War I with many of its members killed, about 10,000 organizers imprisoned, and thousands more deported as foreign agitators. The IWW proved that unskilled workers could be organized. The IWW exists today, but its most significant impact was during its first two decades of existence.


Government and labor

In 1908 the
US Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point of ...
decided ''
Loewe v. Lawlor ''Loewe v. Lawlor'', 208 U.S. 274 (1908), also referred to as the Danbury Hatters' Case, is a United States Supreme Court case in United States labor law concerning the application of antitrust laws to labor unions. The Court's decision effectivel ...
'' (the Danbury Hatters' Case). In 1902 the Hatters' Union instituted a nationwide boycott of the hats made by a nonunion company in Connecticut. Owner Dietrich Loewe brought suit against the union for unlawful combinations to restrain trade in violation of the
Sherman Antitrust Act The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 (, ) is a United States antitrust law which prescribes the rule of free competition among those engaged in commerce. It was passed by Congress and is named for Senator John Sherman, its principal author. ...
. The Court ruled that the union was subject to an injunction and liable for the payment of triple damages. In 1915 Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, speaking for the Court, again decided in favor of Loewe, upholding a lower federal court ruling ordering the union to pay damages of $252,130. (The cost of lawyers had already exceeded $100,000, paid by the AFL). This was not a typical case in which a few union leaders were punished with short terms in jail; specifically, the life savings of several hundreds of the members were attached. The lower court ruling established a major precedent, and became a serious issue for the unions. The
Clayton Act of 1914 The Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914 (, codified at , ), is a part of United States antitrust law with the goal of adding further substance to the U.S. antitrust law regime; the Clayton Act seeks to prevent anticompetitive practices in their incipi ...
presumably exempted unions from the antitrust prohibition and established for the first time the Congressional principle that "the labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of commerce". However, judicial interpretation so weakened it that prosecutions of labor under the antitrust acts continued until the enactment of the Norris-La Guardia Act in 1932. *''
Loewe v. Lawlor ''Loewe v. Lawlor'', 208 U.S. 274 (1908), also referred to as the Danbury Hatters' Case, is a United States Supreme Court case in United States labor law concerning the application of antitrust laws to labor unions. The Court's decision effectivel ...
'', 208 U.S. 274 (1908), 235 U.S. 522 (1915) State legislation 1912–1918: 36 states adopted the principle of workmen's compensation for all industrial accidents. Also: prohibition of the use of an industrial poison, several states require one day's rest in seven, the beginning of effective prohibition of night work, of maximum limits upon the length of the working day, and of minimum wage laws for women.


Colorado Coalfield War

On 23 September 1913, the
United Mine Workers of America The United Mine Workers of America (UMW or UMWA) is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the Unit ...
declared a strike against the
Rockefeller Rockefeller is a German surname, originally given to people from the village of Rockenfeld near Neuwied in the Rhineland and commonly referring to subjects associated with the Rockefeller family. It may refer to: People with the name Rockefeller f ...
-owned
Colorado Fuel and Iron The Colorado Fuel and Iron Company (CF&I) was a large steel conglomerate founded by the merger of previous business interests in 1892.Scamehorn, Chapter 1, "The Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, 1892-1903" page 10 By 1903 it was mainly owned and co ...
, in what is better known as the Colorado Coalfield War. The peak of the violence came after months of back-and-forth murders that culminated in the 20 April 1914 Ludlow Massacre that killed over a dozen women and children when
Colorado National Guard The Colorado National Guard consists of the Colorado Army National Guard and Colorado Air National Guard, forming the state of Colorado's component to the United States National Guard. Founded in 1860, the Colorado National Guard falls under th ...
opened fire on a striker encampment at
Ludlow Ludlow () is a market town in Shropshire, England. The town is significant in the history of the Welsh Marches and in relation to Wales. It is located south of Shrewsbury and north of Hereford, on the A49 road which bypasses the town. The ...
. The strike is considered the deadliest labor unrest in American history.


World War I

Samuel Gompers Samuel Gompers (; January 27, 1850December 13, 1924) was a British-born American cigar maker, labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and served as the organization's ...
and nearly all labor unions were strong supporters of the war effort. They used their leverage to gain recognition and higher wages. They minimized strikes as wages soared and
full employment Full employment is a situation in which there is no cyclical or deficient-demand unemployment. Full employment does not entail the disappearance of all unemployment, as other kinds of unemployment, namely structural and frictional, may remain. F ...
was reached. To keep factories running smoothly, Wilson established the National War Labor Board in 1918, which forced management to negotiate with existing unions. The AFL unions and the railway brotherhoods strongly encouraged their young men to enlist in the
United States Armed Forces The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is ...
. They fiercely opposed efforts to reduce recruiting and slow war production by the anti-war IWW and left-wing Socialists. President Wilson appointed Gompers to the powerful
Council of National Defense The Council of National Defense was a United States organization formed during World War I to coordinate resources and industry in support of the war effort, including the coordination of transportation, industrial and farm production, financial ...
, where he set up the War Committee on Labor. The AFL membership soared to 2.4 million in 1917. Anti-war socialists controlled the IWW, which fought against the war effort and was in turn shut down by legal action of the federal government.


Women in the labor force during WWI

During WWI, large numbers of women were recruited into jobs that had either been vacated by men who had gone to fight in the war, or had been created as part of the war effort. The high demand for weapons and the overall wartime situation resulted in munitions factories collectively becoming the largest employer of American women by 1918. While there was initial resistance to hiring women for jobs traditionally held by men, the war made the need for labor so urgent that women were hired in large numbers and the government even actively promoted the employment of women in war-related industries through recruitment drives. As a result, women not only began working in heavy industry, but also took other jobs traditionally reserved solely for men, such as railway guards, ticket collectors, bus and tram conductors, postal workers, police officers, firefighters, and clerks. World War I saw women taking traditionally men's jobs in large numbers for the first time in
American history The history of the lands that became the United States began with the arrival of the first people in the Americas around 15,000 BC. Numerous indigenous cultures formed, and many saw transformations in the 16th century away from more densel ...
. Many women worked on the
assembly line An assembly line is a manufacturing process (often called a ''progressive assembly'') in which parts (usually interchangeable parts) are added as the semi-finished assembly moves from workstation to workstation where the parts are added in se ...
s of factories, producing trucks and munitions, while
department store A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store made a dramatic appe ...
s employed African American women as
elevator operator An elevator operator (North American English), liftman (in Commonwealth English, usually lift attendant), or lift girl (in British English), is a person specifically employed to operate a manually operated elevator. Description Being an effec ...
s and cafeteria waitresses for the first time. The Food Administration helped housewives prepare more nutritious meals with less waste and with optimum use of the foods available. Morale of women remained high, as millions joined the Red Cross as volunteers to help soldiers and their families, and with rare exceptions, women did not protest the draft. The
United States Department of Labor The United States Department of Labor (DOL) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government. It is responsible for the administration of federal laws governing occupational safety and health, wage and hour standards, unemploy ...
created a Women in Industry group, headed by prominent labor researcher and social scientist Mary van Kleeck. This group helped develop standards for women who were working in industries connected to the war, alongside the
War Labor Policies Board The War Labor Policies Board (WLPB) (1918-1919) was a temporary agency of the United States Government to support American military actions during the end of World War I; future president Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a member. History Fo ...
, of which van Kleeck was also a member. After the war, the Women in Industry Service group developed into the US Women's Bureau, headed by Mary Anderson.


Strikes of 1919

In 1919, the AFL tried to make their gains permanent and called a series of major strikes in meat, steel, and many other industries. Management counterattacked, claiming that key strikes were run by Communists intent on destroying capitalism. Nearly all the strikes ultimately failed, forcing unions back to positions similar to those around 1910.


Coal strike of 1919

The
United Mine Workers The United Mine Workers of America (UMW or UMWA) is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the Unite ...
under John L. Lewis called a strike for November 1, 1919 in all soft (bituminous) coal fields. They had agreed to a wage agreement to run until the end of World War I and now sought to make permanent their wartime gains. US Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer invoked the Lever Act, a wartime measure that made it a crime to interfere with the production or transportation of necessities. Ignoring the court order 400,000 coal workers walked out. The coal operators played the radical card, saying
Vladimir Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1 ...
and
Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian ...
had ordered the strike and were financing it, and some of the press echoed that language. Lewis, facing criminal charges and sensitive to the propaganda campaign, withdrew his strike call. Lewis did not fully control the faction-ridden UAW and many locals ignored his call. As the strike dragged on into its third week, supplies of the nation's main fuel were running low and the public called for ever stronger government action. Final agreement came after five weeks with the miners getting a 14 percent raise, far less than they wanted.


Women telephone operators win strike in 1919

One important strike was won by labor. Moved to action by the rising cost of living, the president of the Boston Telephone Operator's Union,
Julia O'Connor Julia Sarsfield O'Connor (1890–1972) was an American labor leader and head of the National Telephone Operators' Department of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW). She spent her entire forty-five-year career in the labor mo ...
, asked for higher wages from the New England Telephone Company. Wages of operators averaged a third less than women in manufacturing.Philip S. Foner, ''History of the Labor Movement in the United States Volume 8: Postwar Struggles 1918–1920'' New York: International Publishers Co., 1988. p. 88–92 In April, 9,000 women operators in
New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...
went on strike, shutting down most telephone service. The company hired college students as strikebreakers, but they came under violent attack by men supporting the strikers. In a few days a settlement was reached giving higher wages. After the success O'Connor began a national campaign to organize women operators.


Weakness of organized labor, 1920–1929

The 1920s marked a period of sharp decline for the labor movement. Union membership and activities fell sharply in the face of economic prosperity, a lack of leadership within the movement, and anti-union sentiments from both employers and the government. The unions were much less able to organize strikes. In 1919, more than 4 million workers (or 21 percent of the labor force) participated in about 3,600 strikes. In contrast, 1929 witnessed about 289,000 workers (or 1.2 percent of the labor force) stage only 900 strikes. After a short recession in 1920, the 1920s was a generally prosperous decade outside of farming and coal mining. The GNP growth 1921-29 was a very strong 6.0 percent, double the long-term average of about 3 percent. Real annual earnings (in 1914 dollars) for all employees (deducting for unemployment) was $566 in 1921 and $793 in 1929, a real gain of 40 percent. The economic prosperity of the decade led to stable prices, eliminating one major incentive to join unions. Unemployment fell from 11.7 percent in 1921 to 2.4 percent in 1923 and remained in the range of 2 to 5 percent until 1930. The 1920s also saw a lack of strong leadership within the labor movement.
Samuel Gompers Samuel Gompers (; January 27, 1850December 13, 1924) was a British-born American cigar maker, labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and served as the organization's ...
of the
American Federation of Labor The American Federation of Labor (A.F. of L.) was a national federation of labor unions in the United States that continues today as the AFL-CIO. It was founded in Columbus, Ohio, in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions eager to provide mutua ...
died in 1924 after serving as the organization's president for 37 years. Observers said successor William Green, who was the secretary-treasurer of the
United Mine Workers The United Mine Workers of America (UMW or UMWA) is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the Unite ...
, "lacked the aggressiveness and the imagination of the AFL's first president". The AFL was down to less than 3 million members in 1925 after hitting a peak of 4 million members in 1920. Employers across the nation led a successful campaign against unions known as the "American Plan", which sought to depict unions as "alien" to the nation's individualistic spirit. In addition, some employers, like the
National Association of Manufacturers The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) is an advocacy group headquartered in Washington, D.C., with additional offices across the United States. It is the nation's largest manufacturing industrial trade association, representing 14,000 s ...
, used
Red Scare A Red Scare is the promotion of a widespread fear of a potential rise of communism, anarchism or other leftist ideologies by a society or state. The term is most often used to refer to two periods in the history of the United States which ar ...
tactics to discredit unionism by linking them to subversive activities.Smith, Sharon, ''Subterranean Fire'', Haymarket Books, 2006, p. 97. US courts were less hospitable to union activities during the 1920s than in the past. In this decade, corporations used twice as many court injunctions against strikes than any comparable period. In addition, the practice of forcing employees (by threat of termination) to sign
yellow-dog contract A yellow-dog contract (a yellow-dog clause of a contract, also known as an ironclad oath) is an agreement between an employer and an employee in which the employee agrees, as a condition of employment, not to be a member of a labor union. In the ...
s that said they would not join a union was not outlawed until 1932. Although the labor movement fell in prominence during the 1920s, the
Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
would ultimately bring it back to life.


Great Railroad Strike of 1922

The
Great Railroad Strike of 1922 The Great Railroad Strike of 1922, commonly known as the railroad shopmen, Railway Shopmen's Strike, was a nationwide Strike action, strike of railroad workers in the United States. Launched on July 1, 1922, by seven of the sixteen List of Amer ...
, a nationwide railroad shop workers strike, began on July 1. The immediate cause of the strike was the Railroad Labor Board's announcement that hourly wages for railway repair and maintenance workers would be cut by seven cents on July 1. This cut, which represented an average 12 percent wage decrease for the affected workers, prompted a shop workers vote on whether or not to strike. The operators' union did not join in the strike, and the railroads employed strikebreakers to fill three-fourths of the roughly 400,000 vacated positions, increasing hostilities between the railroads and the striking workers.Colin J. Davis, ''Power at Odds: The 1922 National Railroad Shopmen's Strike'' (1997) On September 1, a federal judge issued the sweeping "Daugherty Injunction" against striking, assembling, and picketing. Unions bitterly resented the injunction; a few sympathy strikes shut down some railroads completely. The strike eventually died out as many shopmen made deals with the railroads on the local level. The often unpalatable concessions — coupled with memories of the violence and tension during the strike — soured relations between the railroads and the shopmen for years.


Organized labor, 1929–1955


The Great Depression and organized labor

The stock market crashed in October 1929, and ushered in the
Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
. By the winter of 1932–33, the economy was so perilous that the
unemployment rate Unemployment, according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is people above a specified age (usually 15) not being in paid employment or self-employment but currently available for work during the refere ...
hit the 25 percent mark. Unions lost members during this time because laborers could not afford to pay their dues and furthermore, numerous strikes against wage cuts left the unions impoverished: "one might have expected a reincarnation of organizations seeking to overthrow the capitalistic system that was now performing so poorly. Some workers did indeed turn to such radical movements as the
Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of '' The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engel ...
, but, in general, the nation seemed to have been shocked into inaction". Though unions were not acting yet, cities across the nation witnessed local and spontaneous marches by frustrated relief applicants. In March 1930, hundreds of thousands of unemployed workers marched through New York City, Detroit, Washington, San Francisco and other cities in a mass protest organized by the Communist Party's
Unemployed Councils The Unemployed Councils of the USA (UC) was a mass organization of the Communist Party, USA established in 1930 in an effort to organize and mobilize unemployed workers to advance party policy goals in preparation for an anticipated final confli ...
. In 1931, more than 400 relief protests erupted in Chicago and that number grew to 550 in 1932.Zieger, Robert: ''American Workers, American Unions'', The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994, p. 11–19. The leadership behind these organizations often came from radical groups like Communist and Socialist parties, who wanted to organize "unfocused neighborhood militancy into organized popular defense organizations". However the Great Depression spawned labor action in
Harlan County, Kentucky Harlan County is a county located in southeastern Kentucky. As of the 2020 census, the population was 26,831. Its county seat is Harlan. It is classified as a moist countya county in which alcohol sales are prohibited (a dry county), but conta ...
, now known as the Harlan County War, when the Harlan County Coal Operators Association cut wages by 10% in the winter of 1931. This decision had caused the
United Mine Workers The United Mine Workers of America (UMW or UMWA) is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the Unite ...
to organize, leading to the eviction of the mine workers from the coal town. These evicted workers immigrated to the town of
Evarts, Kentucky Evarts is a home rule-class city in Harlan County, Kentucky, in the United States. The post office was opened on February 9, 1855, and named for one of the area's pioneer families. The city was formally incorporated by the state assembly in 19 ...
, where they would plan union activity. Sheriff J. H. Blair led a force of 140 deputies who were mostly paid by the coal company. Various skirmishes between striking miners and deputies ensued in Evarts. As the situation escalated, socialist organizations such as the
International Workers of the World The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), members of which are commonly termed "Wobblies", is an international labor union that was founded in Chicago in 1905. The origin of the nickname "Wobblies" is uncertain. IWW ideology combines general ...
sent aid to the miners, giving it national coverage.Batteau, Allen: ''The Invention of Appalachia'', p. 117-121. University of Arizona Press, 1990.


The Norris–La Guardia Anti-Injunction Act of 1932

Organized labor became more active in 1932, with the passage of the Norris–La Guardia Act. On March 23, 1932, Republican President
Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was an American politician who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933 and a member of the Republican Party, holding office during the onset of the Gre ...
signed the Norris–La Guardia Act, marking the first of many pro-union bills that Washington would pass in the 1930s. Also known as the Anti-Injunction Bill, it offered procedural and substantive protections against the easy issuance of court injunctions during labor disputes, which had limited union behavior in the 1920s.Cohen, Sanford: ''Labor in the United States'', p. 76. Charles E. Merrill Publishing Company, 1979. Although the act only applied to federal courts, numerous states would pass similar acts in the future. Additionally, the act outlawed
yellow-dog contract A yellow-dog contract (a yellow-dog clause of a contract, also known as an ironclad oath) is an agreement between an employer and an employee in which the employee agrees, as a condition of employment, not to be a member of a labor union. In the ...
s, which were documents some employers forced their employees to sign to ensure they would not join a union; employees who refused to sign were terminated from their jobs. The passage of the Norris–La Guardia Act signified a victory for the
American Federation of Labor The American Federation of Labor (A.F. of L.) was a national federation of labor unions in the United States that continues today as the AFL-CIO. It was founded in Columbus, Ohio, in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions eager to provide mutua ...
, which had been lobbying Congress to pass it for slightly more than five years. It also marked a large change in public policy. Up until the passage of this act, the collective bargaining rights of workers were severely hampered by judicial control.


FDR and the National Industrial Recovery Act

President Franklin D. Roosevelt took office on March 4, 1933, and immediately began implementing programs to alleviate the economic crisis. In June, he passed the
National Industrial Recovery Act The National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 (NIRA) was a US labor law and consumer law passed by the 73rd US Congress to authorize the president to regulate industry for fair wages and prices that would stimulate economic recovery. It also ...
, which gave workers the right to organize into unions. Though it contained other provisions, like minimum wage and maximum hours, its most significant passage was, "Employees shall have the right to organize and bargain collectively through representative of their own choosing, and shall be free from the interference, restraint, or coercion of employers." This portion, which was known as Section 7(a), was symbolic to workers in the United States because it stripped employers of their rights to either coerce them or refuse to bargain with them. While no power of enforcement was written into the law, it "recognized the rights of the industrial working class in the United States". For example, the now
United Mine Workers of America The United Mine Workers of America (UMW or UMWA) is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the Unit ...
were able to reignite the coal labor movement in Kentucky and West Virginia with Section 7(a) and eliminated compulsory residence in company towns for 350,000 miners.Batteau, Allen: ''The Invention of Appalachia'', p. 122. University of Arizona Press, 1990. Although the National Industrial Recovery Act was ultimately deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1935 and replaced by the
Wagner Act The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and ...
two months after that, it fueled workers to join unions and strengthened those organizations. In response to both the Norris–La Guardia Act and the NIRA, workers who were previously unorganized in a number of industries—such as rubber workers, oil and gas workers and service workers—began to look for organizations that would allow them to band together.Milton, David: ''The Politics of U.S. Labor'', Monthly Review Press, 1982, p. 30–32. The NIRA strengthened workers' resolve to unionize and instead of participating in unemployment or hunger marches, they started to participate in strikes for union recognition in various industries". In 1933, the number of work stoppages jumped to 1,695, double its figure from 1932. In 1934, 1,865 strikes occurred, involving more than 1.4 million workers.Smith, Sharon: ''Subterranean Fire'', p. 104. Haymarket Books, 2006. The elections of 1934 might have reflected the "radical upheaval sweeping the country", as Roosevelt won the greatest majority either party ever held in the Senate and 322 Democrats won seats in the
United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they ...
versus 103 Republicans. It is possible that "the great
social movement A social movement is a loosely organized effort by a large group of people to achieve a particular goal, typically a social or political one. This may be to carry out a social change, or to resist or undo one. It is a type of group action and ma ...
from below thus strengthened the independence of the executive branch of government". Despite the impact of such changes on the United States' political structure and on workers' empowerment, some scholars have criticized the impacts of these policies from a classical economic perspective. Cole and Ohanian (2004) find that the New Deal's pro-labor policies are an important factor in explaining the weak recovery from the Great Depression and the rise in real wages in some industrial sectors during this time.


The American Federation of Labor: craft unionism vs. industrial unionism

The AFL was growing rapidly, from 2.1 million members in 1933 to 3.4 million in 1936. But it was experiencing severe internal stresses regarding how to organize new members. Traditionally, the AFL organized unions by craft rather than industry, where electricians or stationary engineers would form their own skill-oriented unions, rather than join a large automobile-making union. Most AFL leaders, including president William Green, were reluctant to shift from the organization's long-standing
craft unionism Craft unionism refers to a model of trade unionism in which workers are organised based on the particular craft or trade in which they work. It contrasts with industrial unionism, in which all workers in the same industry are organized into the sa ...
and started to clash with other leaders within the organization, such as John L. Lewis. The issue came up at the annual AFL convention in San Francisco in 1934 and 1935, but the majority voted against a shift to
industrial unionism Industrial unionism is a trade union organizing method through which all workers in the same industry are organized into the same union, regardless of skill or trade, thus giving workers in one industry, or in all industries, more leverage in ...
both years. After the defeat at the 1935 convention, nine leaders from the industrial faction led by Lewis met and organized the Committee for Industrial Organization within the AFL to "encourage and promote organization of workers in the mass production industries" for "educational and advisory" functions. The CIO, which later changed its name to the
Congress of Industrial Organizations The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. Originally created in 1935 as a committee within the American Federation of ...
(CIO), formed unions with the hope of bringing them into the AFL, but the AFL refused to extend full membership privileges to CIO unions. In 1938, the AFL expelled the CIO and its million members, and they formed a rival federation. The two federations fought it out for membership; while both supported Roosevelt and the New Deal, the CIO was further to the left, while the AFL had close ties to the big city machines.


John L. Lewis and the CIO

John L. Lewis (1880–1969) was the president of the
United Mine Workers of America The United Mine Workers of America (UMW or UMWA) is a North American labor union best known for representing coal miners. Today, the Union also represents health care workers, truck drivers, manufacturing workers and public employees in the Unit ...
(UMW) from 1920 to 1960, and the driving force behind the founding of the
Congress of Industrial Organizations The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. Originally created in 1935 as a committee within the American Federation of ...
(CIO). Using UMW organizers the new CIO established the
United Steel Workers of America The United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, commonly known as the United Steelworkers (USW), is a general trade union with members across North America. Headquar ...
(USWA) and organized millions of other industrial workers in the 1930s. Lewis threw his support behind Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) at the outset of the
New Deal The New Deal was a series of programs, public work projects, financial reforms, and regulations enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1939. Major federal programs agencies included the Civilian Con ...
. After the passage of the
Wagner Act The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and ...
in 1935, Lewis traded on the tremendous appeal that Roosevelt had with workers in those days, sending organizers into the coal fields to tell workers "The President wants you to join the Union." His UMW was one of FDR's main financial supporters in 1936, contributing over $500,000. Lewis expanded his base by organizing the so-called "captive mines", those held by the steel producers such as
US Steel United States Steel Corporation, more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an American integrated steel producer headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with production operations primarily in the United States of America and in several countries ...
. That required in turn organizing the steel industry, which had defeated union organizing drives in 1892 and 1919 and which had resisted all organizing efforts since then fiercely. The task of organizing steelworkers, on the other hand, put Lewis at odds with the AFL, which looked down on both industrial workers and the industrial unions that represented all workers in a particular industry, rather than just those in a particular skilled trade or craft. Lewis was the first president of the Committee of Industrial Organizations. Lewis, in fact, was the CIO: his UMWA provided the great bulk of the financial resources that the CIO poured into organizing drives by the
United Automobile Workers The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers (UAW), is an American labor union that represents workers in the United States (including Puerto Rico) ...
(UAW), the
United Steelworkers of America The United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, commonly known as the United Steelworkers (USW), is a general trade union with members across North America. Headquar ...
, the Textile Workers Union and other newly formed or struggling unions. Lewis hired back many of the people he had exiled from the UMWA in the 1920s to lead the CIO and placed his protégé
Philip Murray Philip Murray (May 25, 1886 – November 9, 1952) was a Scottish-born steelworker and an American labor leader. He was the first president of the Steel Workers Organizing Committee (SWOC), the first president of the United Steelworkers o ...
at the head of the
Steel Workers Organizing Committee The Steel Workers Organizing Committee (SWOC) was one of two precursor labor organizations to the United Steelworkers. It was formed by the CIO ( Committee for Industrial Organization) on June 7, 1936. It disbanded in 1942 to become the United Stee ...
. The most dramatic success was the 1936-7 sit-down strike that paralyzed
General Motors The General Motors Company (GM) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturing company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is the largest automaker in the United States and ...
. It enabled CIO unionization of GM and the main automobile firms (except the
Ford Motor Company Ford Motor Company (commonly known as Ford) is an American multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. The company sells automobi ...
, which held out for a few years). However it had negative ramifications, as the Gallup Poll reported, "More than anything else the use of the sit-down strike alienated the sympathies of the middle classes". The CIO's actual membership (as opposed to publicity figures) was 2,850,000 for February 1942. This included 537,000 members of the auto workers (UAW), nearly 500,000 Steel Workers, almost 300,000 members of the
Amalgamated Clothing Workers Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America (ACWA) was a United States labor union known for its support for "social unionism" and progressive political causes. Led by Sidney Hillman for its first thirty years, it helped found the Congress of Indus ...
, about 180,000 Electrical Workers, and about 100,000 Rubber Workers. The CIO also included 550,000 members of the United Mine Workers, which did not formally withdraw from the CIO until later in the year. The remaining membership of 700,000 was scattered among thirty-odd smaller unions. Historians of the union movement in the 1930s have tried to explain its remarkable success in terms of the rank and file—what motivated them to suddenly rally around leaders (such as John L. Lewis) who had been around for decades with little success. Why was the militancy of the mid-1930s so short lived?


Union upsurge in World War II

Union membership grew very rapidly from 2.8 million in 1933 to 8.4 million in 1941, covering 23% of the non-farm workforce, reaching 14 million in 1945, about 36 percent of the work force. By the mid-1950s, the merged AFL-CIO still collected dues from over 15 million members, a third of the non-farm workforce. Unionization was strongest in large northern cities, and weakest across the south, where repeated mobilization efforts failed. The 1937 split off of the CIO cost the AFL over a million members, but it added 760,000 on its own. Between 1937 and 1945 the CIO recruited two million new members, but the AFL recruited nearly 4 million. After some bitter battles in the late 1930s, the AFL and CIO had relatively few jurisdictional disputes, each focusing on its own specialized industries. The CIO was strongest in large manufacturing industries especially auto, steel, meatpacking, coal, and electrical appliances. The AFL affiliates were strongest in construction trades, trucking, department stores, and public service. The railway brotherhoods continued their independent status. Both the AFL and CIO supported Roosevelt in 1940 and 1944, with 75 percent or more of their votes, after spending millions of dollars, and mobilizing tens of thousands of precinct workers. However, Lewis opposed Roosevelt on foreign policy grounds in 1940, but his members ignored his advice to voted against FDR and he resigned as CIO chief. During the 22 months 1939-1941 when Stalin and Hitler supported each other, the far-left opposed American aid to Britain's war against Germany. They called strikes in war industries that were supplying Lend Lease to Britain. The most dramatic case came in early June 1941, when a wildcat strike near Los Angeles closed the plant that produced a fourth of the fighter-planes. With the approval of CIO leadership, President Roosevelt sent in the national guard to reopen the plant. However, when Germany suddenly invaded the USSR in late June 1941, the Communist activists suddenly became the strongest supporters of war production; they crushed wildcat strikes. Lewis realized that he had enormous leverage over the nation's energy supply. In 1943, the middle of the war, when the rest of labor was observing a policy against strikes, Lewis led the coal miners out on a twelve-day strike for higher wages. The bipartisan
Conservative coalition The conservative coalition, founded in 1937, was an unofficial alliance of members of the United States Congress which brought together the conservative wings of the Republican and Democratic parties to oppose President Franklin Delano Roosev ...
in Congress passed anti-union legislation over liberal opposition, most notably the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. A statistical analysis of the AFL and CIO national and local leaders in 1945 shows that opportunity for advancement in the labor movement was wide open. In contrast with other elites, the labor leaders did not come from established
WASP A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder ...
families with rich, well-educated backgrounds. Indeed, they closely resembled the overall national population of adult men, with fewer from the South and from farm backgrounds. The union leaders were heavily Democratic. The newer CIO had a younger leadership, and one more involved with third parties, and less involved with local civic activities. Otherwise the AFL and CIO leaders were quite similar in background.


Women take new jobs in World War II

The war caused the military mobilization of 16 million American men, leaving a huge hole in the urban work force. (Men in farming were exempt from the draft.) In 1945, 37% of women were employed, encouraged by factors such as patriotism and the chance for high wages. One in 4 married women were working by 1945. Many domestic workers took jobs that paid much better, especially in war factories. During the war nearly 6 million women joined the workforce. They filled roles that men had monopolized, such as steel workers, lumber workers, and bus drivers. By 1945 there were 4.7 women in clerical positions which was an 89% increase from 1940. Another 4.5 million women working in factories, usually in unskilled positions, up 112%. The
aviation Aviation includes the activities surrounding mechanical flight and the aircraft industry. ''Aircraft'' includes airplane, fixed-wing and helicopter, rotary-wing types, morphable wings, wing-less lifting bodies, as well as aerostat, lighter- ...
industry saw the highest increase in female workers during the war. By 1943 310,000 women worked there, or 65% of the industry's workforce. While women's wages rose more relative to men's during this period, real wages did not increase due to higher wartime income taxes. Although jobs that had been previously closed to women opened up, demographics such as African American women who had already been participating more fully experienced less change. Their husbands' income effect was historically even more positive than white women's. During the war, African American women engagement as domestic servants decreased from 59.9% to 44.6%, but Karen Anderson in 1982 characterized their experience as “last hired, first fired.” At the end of the war, most of the munitions-making jobs ended. Many factories were closed; others retooled for civilian production. In some jobs, women were replaced by returning veterans who did not lose seniority because they were in service. However, the number of women at work in 1946 was 87% of the number in 1944, leaving 13% left the labor force to become housewives.


Walter Reuther and UAW

The Flint Sit-Down Strike of 1936–37 was the decisive event in the formation of the
United Auto Workers Union The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers (UAW), is an American labor union that represents workers in the United States (including Puerto Rico) ...
(UAW). During the war
Walter Reuther Walter Philip Reuther (; September 1, 1907 – May 9, 1970) was an American leader of organized labor and civil rights activist who built the United Automobile Workers (UAW) into one of the most progressive labor unions in American history. He ...
took control of the UAW, and soon led major strikes in 1946. He ousted the Communists from the positions of power, especially at the Ford local. He was one of the most articulate and energetic leaders of the CIO, and of the merged AFL-CIO. Using brilliant negotiating tactics he leveraged high profits for the Big Three automakers into higher wages and superior benefits for UAW members.


PAC and politics of 1940s

New enemies appeared for the labor unions after 1935. Newspaper columnist
Westbrook Pegler Francis James Westbrook Pegler (August 2, 1894 – June 24, 1969) was an American journalist and writer. He was a popular columnist in the 1930s and 1940s famed for his opposition to the New Deal and labor unions. Pegler aimed his pen at president ...
was especially outraged by the New Deal's support for powerful labor unions that he considered morally and politically corrupt. Pegler saw himself a populist and muckraker whose mission was to warn the nation that dangerous leaders were in power. In 1941 Pegler became the first columnist ever to win a
Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made ...
for reporting, for his work in exposing
racketeering Racketeering is a type of organized crime in which the perpetrators set up a coercive, fraudulent, extortionary, or otherwise illegal coordinated scheme or operation (a "racket") to repeatedly or consistently collect a profit. Originally and ...
in Hollywood labor unions, focusing on the criminal career of William Morris Bioff. Pegler's popularity reflected a loss of support for unions and liberalism generally, especially as shown by the dramatic Republican gains in the 1946 elections, often using an anti-union theme.


Strike wave of 1945

With the end of the war in August 1945 came a wave of major strikes, mostly led by the CIO. In November, the UAW sent their 180,000 GM workers to the picket lines; they were joined in January 1946 by a half-million steelworkers, as well as over 200,000 electrical workers and 150,000 packinghouse workers. Combined with many smaller strikes a new record of strike activity was set.Ziegler, ''CIO'' pp. 212–13 The results were mixed, with the unions making some gains, but the economy was disordered by the rapid termination of war contracts, the complex reconversion to peacetime production, the return to the labor force of 12 million servicemen, and the return home of millions of women workers. The conservative control of Congress blocked liberal legislation, and "
Operation Dixie Operation Dixie was the name of the post- World War II campaign by the Congress of Industrial Organizations to unionize industry in the Southern United States, particularly the textile industry. Launched in the spring of 1946, the campaign ran in 1 ...
", the CIO's efforts to expand massively into the
Southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...
, failed. The
Republican Party Republican Party is a name used by many political parties around the world, though the term most commonly refers to the United States' Republican Party. Republican Party may also refer to: Africa * Republican Party (Liberia) *Republican Party ...
exploited public anger at the unions in 1946, winning a smashing landslide. Labor responded afterwards by taking strong actions. The CIO systematically purged communists and far-left sympathizers from leadership roles in its unions. The CIO expelled some unions that resisted the purge, notably its third-largest affiliate the
United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America The United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), is an independent democratic rank-and-file labor union representing workers in both the private and public sectors across the United States. UE was one of the first unions to be c ...
(UE), and set up a new rival IUE to take away the UE membership. Meanwhile, the AFL in 1947 set up its first explicitly political unit, Labor's League for Political Education. The AFL increasingly abandoned its historic tradition of nonpartisanship, since neutrality between the major parties was impossible. By 1952, the AFL had given up on decentralization, local autonomy, and non-partisanship, and had developed instead a new political approach marked by the same style of centralization, national coordination, and partisan alliances that characterized the CIO. After these moves, the CIO and AFL were in a good position to fight off Henry Wallace in the 1948 presidential election and work enthusiastically for Harry S. Truman's reelection. The CIO and AFL no longer had major points of conflict, so they merged amicably in 1955 as the
AFL–CIO The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO) is the largest federation of unions in the United States. It is made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 12 million ac ...
.


Taft-Hartley Act

The
Labor Management Relations Act of 1947 Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...
, also known as the ''Taft–Hartley Act'', in 1947 revised the
Wagner Act The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and ...
to include restrictions on unions as well as management. It was a response to public demands for action after the wartime coal strikes and the postwar strikes in steel, autos and other industries that were perceived to have damaged the economy, as well as a threatened 1946 railroad strike that was called off at the last minute before it shut down the national economy. The Act was bitterly fought by unions, vetoed by President Harry S. Truman, and passed over his veto. Repeated union efforts to repeal or modify it always failed, and it remains in effect today. The Act was sponsored by Senator
Robert A. Taft Robert Alphonso Taft Sr. (September 8, 1889 – July 31, 1953) was an American politician, lawyer, and scion of the Republican Party's Taft family. Taft represented Ohio in the United States Senate, briefly served as Senate Majority Leade ...
and Representative
Fred Hartley Fred Hartley (1905–1980) was a Scottish pianist, conductor and composer of light music best known for his waltz ''Rouge et Noir''. He sometimes composed music under the pseudonym Iris Taylor.Philip Scowcrof76th Garland Retrieved 17 September ...
, both Republicans. Congress overrode the veto on June 23, 1947, establishing the act as a law. Truman described the act as a "slave-labor bill" in his veto, but after it was enacted over his veto, he used its emergency provisions a number of times to halt strikes and lockouts. The new law required all union officials to sign an affidavit that they were not Communists or else the union would lose its federal bargaining powers guaranteed by the National Labor Relations Board. (That provision was declared to be an
unconstitutional Constitutionality is said to be the condition of acting in accordance with an applicable constitution; "Webster On Line" the status of a law, a procedure, or an act's accordance with the laws or set forth in the applicable constitution. When l ...
bill of attainder A bill of attainder (also known as an act of attainder or writ of attainder or bill of penalties) is an act of a legislature declaring a person, or a group of people, guilty of some crime, and punishing them, often without a trial. As with attai ...
by a 1965 Supreme Court decision, United States v. Brown.) The Taft-Hartley Act amended the Wagner Act, officially known as the
National Labor Relations Act The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and ...
, of 1935. The amendments added to the NLRA a list of prohibited actions, or "unfair labor practices", on the part of unions. The NLRA had previously prohibited only unfair labor practices committed by employers. It prohibited jurisdictional strikes, in which a union strikes in order to pressure an employer to assign particular work to the employees that union represents, and
secondary boycotts Solidarity action (also known as secondary action, a secondary boycott, a solidarity strike, or a sympathy strike) is industrial action by a trade union in support of a strike initiated by workers in a separate corporation, but often the same en ...
and "common situs"
picketing Picketing is a form of protest in which people (called pickets or picketers) congregate outside a place of work or location where an event is taking place. Often, this is done in an attempt to dissuade others from going in (" crossing the pick ...
, in which unions picket, strike, or refuse to handle the goods of a business with which they have no primary dispute but which is associated with a targeted business. A later statute, the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act, passed in 1959, tightened these restrictions on secondary boycotts still further. The Act outlawed
closed shop A pre-entry closed shop (or simply closed shop) is a form of union security agreement under which the employer agrees to hire union members only, and employees must remain members of the union at all times to remain employed. This is different fr ...
s, which were contractual agreements that required an employer to hire only union members.
Union shop In labor law, a union shop, also known as a post-entry closed shop, is a form of a union security clause. Under this, the employer agrees to either only hire labor union members or to require that any new employees who are not already union me ...
s, in which new recruits must join the union within a certain amount of time, are permitted, but only as part of a
collective bargaining agreement A collective agreement, collective labour agreement (CLA) or collective bargaining agreement (CBA) is a written contract negotiated through collective bargaining for employees by one or more trade unions with the management of a company (or with an ...
and only if the contract allows the worker at least thirty days after the date of hire or the effective date of the contract to join the union. The National Labor Relations Board and the courts have added other restrictions on the power of unions to enforce union security clauses and have required them to make extensive financial disclosures to all members as part of their
duty of fair representation The duty of fair representation is incumbent upon Canadian and U.S. labor unions that are the exclusive bargaining representative of workers in a particular group. It is the obligation to represent all employees fairly, in good faith, and without ...
. On the other hand, a few years after the passage of the Act Congress repealed the provisions requiring a vote by workers to authorize a union shop, when it became apparent that workers were approving them in virtually every case. The amendments also authorized individual states to outlaw union security clauses entirely in their jurisdictions by passing "right-to-work" laws. Currently all of the states in the
Deep South The Deep South or the Lower South is a cultural and geographic subregion in the Southern United States. The term was first used to describe the states most dependent on plantations and slavery prior to the American Civil War. Following the wa ...
and a number of traditionally Republican states in the
Midwest The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...
,
Plains In geography, a plain is a flat expanse of land that generally does not change much in elevation, and is primarily treeless. Plains occur as lowlands along valleys or at the base of mountains, as coastal plains, and as plateaus or uplands. In ...
and
Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...
regions have right-to-work laws. The amendments required unions and employers to give sixty days' notice before they may undertake strikes or other forms of economic action in pursuit of a new collective bargaining agreement; it did not, on the other hand, impose any "cooling-off period" after a contract expired. Although the Act also authorized the
President of the United States The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the Federal government of the United States#Executive branch, executive branch of the Federal gove ...
to intervene in strikes or potential strikes that create a national emergency, the President has used that power less and less frequently in each succeeding decade. Historian James T. Patterson concludes that: :: By the 1950s most observers agreed that Taft-Hartley was no more disastrous for workers than the Wagner Act had been for employers. What ordinarily mattered most in labor relations was not government laws such as Taft-Hartley, but the relative power of unions and management in the economic marketplace. Where unions were strong they usually managed all right; when they were weak, new laws did them little additional harm.


Anti-communism

The AFL had always opposed Communists inside the labor movement. After 1945 they took their crusade worldwide. The CIO had major Communist elements who played a key role in organizational work in the late 1930s and war years. By 1949 they were purged. The AFL and CIO strongly supported the
Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...
policies of the Truman administration, including the
Truman Doctrine The Truman Doctrine is an American foreign policy that pledged American "support for democracies against authoritarian threats." The doctrine originated with the primary goal of containing Soviet geopolitical expansion during the Cold War. It wa ...
, the
Marshall Plan The Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program, ERP) was an American initiative enacted in 1948 to provide foreign aid to Western Europe. The United States transferred over $13 billion (equivalent of about $ in ) in economic re ...
and
NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two N ...
. Left-wing elements in the CIO protested and were forced out of the main unions. Thus
Walter Reuther Walter Philip Reuther (; September 1, 1907 – May 9, 1970) was an American leader of organized labor and civil rights activist who built the United Automobile Workers (UAW) into one of the most progressive labor unions in American history. He ...
of the
United Automobile Workers The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers (UAW), is an American labor union that represents workers in the United States (including Puerto Rico) ...
purged the UAW of all Communist elements. He was active in the CIO umbrella as well, taking the lead in expelling eleven Communist-dominated unions from the CIO in 1949. As a leader of the anti-Communist center-left, Reuther was a founder of the liberal umbrella group
Americans for Democratic Action Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) is a liberal American political organization advocating progressive policies. ADA views itself as supporting social and economic justice through lobbying, grassroots organizing, research, and supporting pr ...
in 1947. In 1949 he led the CIO delegation to the London conference that set up the
International Confederation of Free Trade Unions The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) was an international trade union. It came into being on 7 December 1949 following a split within the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU), and was dissolved on 31 October 2006 when ...
in opposition to the communist-dominated
World Federation of Trade Unions The World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) is an international federation of trade unions established in 1945. Founded in the immediate aftermath of World War Two, the organization built on the pre-war legacy of the International Federation o ...
. He had left the Socialist Party in 1939, and throughout the 1950s and 1960s was a leading spokesman for liberal interests in the CIO and in the Democratic Party.
James B. Carey James Barron Carey (August 12, 1911 – September 11, 1973) was a 20th-century American labor union leader; secretary-treasurer of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) (1938–55); vice-president of AFL–CIO (from 1955); served as pre ...
also helped influence the CIO's pullout from the WFTU and the formation of the
International Confederation of Free Trade Unions The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) was an international trade union. It came into being on 7 December 1949 following a split within the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU), and was dissolved on 31 October 2006 when ...
dedicated to promoting free trade and democratic unionism worldwide. Carey in 1949 had formed the
International Union of Electrical Workers The International Union of Electrical Workers (IUE) was a North American labor union representing workers in the electrical manufacturing industry. While consistently using the acronym IUE, it took on several full names during its history, origin ...
, a new CIO union for electrical workers, because the old one, the
United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America The United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), is an independent democratic rank-and-file labor union representing workers in both the private and public sectors across the United States. UE was one of the first unions to be c ...
, was tightly controlled by the left. Marxian economist Richard D. Wolff argues that anti-communism was part of a strategy by big business, Republicans and conservatives to single out and destroy the members of the coalition that forced through the
New Deal The New Deal was a series of programs, public work projects, financial reforms, and regulations enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1939. Major federal programs agencies included the Civilian Con ...
, namely organized labor, socialist and communist parties.


Union decline, 1955–2016

Since its peak in the mid-20th century, the American labor movement has been in steady decline, with losses in the private sector larger than gains in the public sector. In the early 1950s, as the AFL and CIO merged, around a third of the American labor force was unionized; by 2012, the proportion was 11 percent, constituting roughly 5 percent in the private sector and 40 percent in the public sector. Organized labor's influence steadily waned and workers' collective voice in the political process has weakened. Partly as a result, wages have stagnated and
income inequality There are wide varieties of economic inequality, most notably income inequality measured using the distribution of income (the amount of money people are paid) and wealth inequality measured using the distribution of wealth (the amount of we ...
has increased. "Although the
National Labor Relations Act The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and ...
was initially a boon for unions, it also sowed the seeds of the labor movement's decline. The act enshrined the right to unionize, but the system of workplace elections it created meant that unions had to organize each new factory or firm individually rather than organize by industry. In many European countries, collective-bargaining agreements extended automatically to other firms in the same industry, but in the United States, they usually reached no further than a plant's gates. As a result, in the first decades of the postwar period, the organizing effort could not keep pace with the frenetic rate of job growth in the economy as a whole". On the political front, the shrinking unions lost influence in the Democratic Party, and pro-union liberal Republicans faded away. Intellectuals lost interest in unions, focusing their attention more on the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
, minorities,
women A woman is an adult female human. Prior to adulthood, a female human is referred to as a girl (a female child or Adolescence, adolescent). The plural ''women'' is sometimes used in certain phrases such as "women's rights" to denote female hum ...
and
environmental issues Environmental issues are effects of human activity on the biophysical environment, most often of which are harmful effects that cause environmental degradation. Environmental protection is the practice of protecting the natural environment on t ...
. By the 1970s, a rapidly increasing flow of imports (such as automobiles, steel and electronics from Germany and Japan, and clothing and shoes from Asia) undercut American producers. By the 1980s there was a large-scale shift in employment with fewer workers in high-wage sectors and more in the low-wage sectors. Many companies closed or moved factories to Southern states (where unions were weak). The effectiveness of strikes declined sharply, as companies after the 1970s threatened to close down factories or move them to low-wage states or to foreign countries. The number of major work stoppages fell by 97 percent from 381 in 1970 to 187 in 1980 to only 11 in 2010. The accumulating weaknesses were exposed when President
Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician, actor, and union leader who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 ...
—a former union president—broke the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) strike in 1981, dealing a major blow to unions. Union membership among workers in private industry shrank dramatically, though after 1970 there was growth in employees unions of federal, state and local governments. The intellectual mood in the 1970s and 1980s favored
deregulation Deregulation is the process of removing or reducing state regulations, typically in the economic sphere. It is the repeal of governmental regulation of the economy. It became common in advanced industrial economies in the 1970s and 1980s, as a ...
and free competition.Martha Derthick and Paul J. Quirk, ''The Politics of Deregulation'' (1985) p. 218 Numerous industries were deregulated, including airlines, trucking, railroads and telephones, over the objections of the unions involved. Republicans, using conservative
think tank A think tank, or policy institute, is a research institute that performs research and advocacy concerning topics such as social policy, political strategy, economics, military, technology, and culture. Most think tanks are non-govern ...
s as idea farms, began to push through legislative blueprints to curb the power of public employee unions as well as eliminate business regulations. Union weakness in the
Southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...
undermined unionization and social reform throughout the nation, and such weakness is largely responsible for the anaemic US
welfare state A welfare state is a form of government in which the state (or a well-established network of social institutions) protects and promotes the economic and social well-being of its citizens, based upon the principles of equal opportunity, equita ...
.


AFL and CIO merger 1955

The friendly merger of the AFL and CIO marked an end not only to the acrimony and jurisdictional conflicts between the coalitions, it also signaled the end of the era of experimentation and expansion that began in the mid-1930s. Merger became politically possible because of the deaths of Green of the AFL and Murray of the CIO in late 1952, replaced by
George Meany William George Meany (August 16, 1894 – January 10, 1980) was an American labor union leader for 57 years. He was the key figure in the creation of the AFL–CIO and served as the AFL–CIO's first president, from 1955 to 1979. Meany, the son ...
and Reuther. The CIO was no longer the radical dynamo, and was no longer a threat in terms of membership for the AFL had twice as many members.Zieger, ''CIO'' p. 357–69 Furthermore, the AFL was doing a better job of expanding into the fast-growing white collar sector, with its organizations of clerks, public employees, teachers, and service workers. Although the AFL building trades maintained all-white policies, the AFL had more black members in all as the CIO. The problem of union corruption was growing in public awareness, and CIO's industrial unions were less vulnerable to penetration by criminal elements than were the AFL's trucking, longshoring, building, and entertainment unions. But Meany had a strong record in fighting corruption in New York unions, and was highly critical of the notoriously corrupt Teamsters. Unification would help the central organization fight corruption, yet would not contaminate the CIO unions. The defeat of the New Deal in the 1952 election further emphasized the need for unity to maximize political effectiveness. From the CIO side the merger was promoted by David McDonald of the Steelworkers and his top aide
Arthur J. Goldberg Arthur Joseph Goldberg (August 8, 1908January 19, 1990) was an American statesman and jurist who served as the 9th U.S. Secretary of Labor, an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, and the 6th United States Ambassador to ...
. To achieve the successful merger, they jettisoned the more liberal policies of the CIO regarding civil rights and membership rights for blacks, jurisdictional disputes, and industrial unionism. Reuther went along with the compromises and did not contest the selection of Meany to head the AFL-CIO. Fearing the fallout of a drawn-out negotiation process, the AFL and CIO leadership decided on a "short route" to reconciliation. This meant all AFL and CIO unions would be accepted into the new organization "as is," with all conflicts and overlaps to be sorted out after the merger. Negotiations were conducted by a small, select group of advisors. The draft constitution was primarily written by AFL Vice President
Matthew Woll Matthew Woll (January 25, 1880 – June 1, 1956) was president of the International Photo-Engravers Union of North America from 1906 to 1929, an American Federation of Labor (AFL) vice president from 1919 to 1955 and an AFL-CIO vice president ...
and CIO General Counsel
Arthur Goldberg Arthur Joseph Goldberg (August 8, 1908January 19, 1990) was an American statesman and jurist who served as the 9th U.S. Secretary of Labor, an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, and the 6th United States Ambassador to ...
, while the joint policy statements were written by Woll, CIO Secretary-Treasurer James Carey, CIO vice presidents David McDonald and
Joseph Curran Joseph Curran (March 1, 1906 – August 14, 1981) was a merchant seaman and an American labor leader. He was founding president of the National Maritime Union (or NMU, now part of the Seafarers International Union of North America) from 1937 ...
, Brotherhood of Railway Clerks President
George Harrison George Harrison (25 February 1943 – 29 November 2001) was an English musician and singer-songwriter who achieved international fame as the lead guitarist of the Beatles. Sometimes called "the quiet Beatle", Harrison embraced Indian c ...
, and Illinois AFL-CIO President
Reuben Soderstrom Reuben George Soderstrom (March 10, 1888 – December 15, 1970) was an American leader of organized labor who served as President of the Illinois State Federation of Labor (ISFL) and Illinois AFL-CIO from 1930 to 1970. A key figure in Chicago a ...
.


Conservative attacks

Labor unions were a whole high-profile target of Republican activists throughout the 1940s and 1950s, especially the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. Both the business community and local Republicans wanted to weaken unions, which played a major role in funding and campaigning for Democratic candidates. The strategy of the Eisenhower administration was to consolidate the anti-union potential inherent in Taft-Hartley. Pressure from the Justice Department, the Labor Department, and especially from congressional investigations focused on criminal activity and racketeering in high-profile labor unions, especially the Teamsters Union. Republicans wanted to delegitimize unions by focusing on their shady activities. The
McClellan Committee The United States Senate Select Committee on Improper Activities in Labor and Management (also known as the McClellan Committee) was a select committee created by the United States Senate on January 30, 1957,Hilty, James. ''Robert Kennedy: Broth ...
hearings targeted Teamsters president James R. Hoffa as a public enemy. Young Robert F. Kennedy played a major role working for the committee. Public opinion polls showed growing distrust toward unions, and especially union leaders — or "labor bosses," as Republicans called them. The bipartisan
Conservative Coalition The conservative coalition, founded in 1937, was an unofficial alliance of members of the United States Congress which brought together the conservative wings of the Republican and Democratic parties to oppose President Franklin Delano Roosev ...
, with the aid of liberals such as the Kennedy brothers, won new Congressional restrictions on organized labor in the form of the Landrum-Griffin Act (1959). The main impact was to force more democracy on the previously authoritarian union hierarchies. However, in the 1958 elections, taking place during a sharp economic recession, the unions fought back especially against state
Right to Work laws In the context of labor law in the United States, the term "right-to-work laws" refers to state laws that prohibit union security agreements between employers and labor unions which require employees who are not union members to contribute t ...
and defeated many conservative Republicans. The Teamsters union was expelled from the AFL for its notorious corruption under president
Dave Beck David Daniel Beck (June 16, 1894December 26, 1993) was an American labor leader, and president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters from 1952 to 1957. He helped found the "Conference" system of organization in the Teamsters union, and s ...
. Its troubles gained national attention from highly visible Senate hearings. The target was
Jimmy Hoffa James Riddle Hoffa (born February 14, 1913 – disappeared July 30, 1975; declared dead July 30, 1982) was an American labor union leader who served as the president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) from 1957 until 1971. ...
(1913–1975), who replaced Beck and held total power until he was imprisoned in 1964.


1960s: Liberal achievement in Civil Rights and backlash

The UAW under Reuther played a major role in funding and supporting the
Civil Rights Movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the Unite ...
in the 1950s and 1960s. More traditional unions favored their white members and encountered federal court intervention. After the smashing reelection victory of President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964, the heavily Democratic Congress passed a raft of liberal legislation. Labor union leaders claimed credit for the widest range of liberal laws since the New Deal era, including the Civil Rights Act of 1964; the Voting Rights Act of 1965; the War on Poverty; aid to cities and education; increased Social Security benefits; and Medicare for the elderly. The 1966 elections were an unexpected disaster, with defeats for many of the more liberal Democrats. According to Alan Draper, the AFL-CIO Committee on Political Action (COPE) was the main electioneering unit of the labor movement. It ignored the white backlash against civil rights, which had become a main Republican attack point. The COPE assumed falsely that union members were interested in issues of greatest salience to union leadership, but polls showed this was not true. The members were much more conservative. The younger ones were much more concerned about taxes and crime, and the older ones had not overcome racial biases. Furthermore, a new issue—the War in Vietnam—was bitterly splitting the New Deal coalition into hawks (led by Johnson and Vice-president
Hubert Humphrey Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was an American pharmacist and politician who served as the 38th vice president of the United States from 1965 to 1969. He twice served in the United States Senate, representing ...
) and doves (led by Senators
Eugene McCarthy Eugene Joseph McCarthy (March 29, 1916December 10, 2005) was an American politician, writer, and academic from Minnesota. He served in the United States House of Representatives from 1949 to 1959 and the United States Senate from 1959 to 1971. ...
and
Robert Kennedy Robert Francis Kennedy (November 20, 1925June 6, 1968), also known by his initials RFK and by the nickname Bobby, was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 64th United States Attorney General from January 1961 to September 1964, a ...
).


Hispanics and United Farm Workers, 1960s

Hispanics comprise a large fraction of the farm labor force, but due to the fact that agricultural workers were not protected under the National Labor Relations Act of 1935, National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) of 1935, there was little successful unionization before the arrival in the 1960s of Cesar Chavez (1927–1993) and Dolores Huerta, Dolores Huerta (1930), who mobilized California workers into the United Farm Workers (UFW) organization. Chavez's use of non-violent methods combined with Huerta's organizational skills allowed for many of the bigger successes of the organization. A key success for the UFW, which at the time was still being called the National Farm Workers Association, was in partnering with the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), which primarily worked with Filipino farm workers, and creating the eventual United Farmworkers Union in 1972. Together, they organized a worker strike and consumer boycott of the grape growers in California that lasted for over five years. Through collaboration with consumers and student protesters, the UFW was able to secure a three-year contract with the state's top grape growers to increase the safety and pay of farm workers. Their efforts continued to grow throughout the United States where in 1973 they secured another 3-year contract with Minute Maid's parent company Coca-Cola Enterprises, Coca-Cola that addressed the low wages and poor living conditions of Florida citrus farm workers. The UFW worked in Arizona beginning in 1968 to address the risks of pesticides. Other UFW successes include securing with political allies, as the result of California's continuing strikes, an Agricultural Relations Board in the state, after much conflict with the Teamsters in the mid-1970s. Chavez had a significant political impact; as Jenkins points out, "state and national elites no longer automatically sided with the growers." Thus, the political insurgency of the UFW was successful because of effective strategizing in the right kind of political environment. In the decades following its early success, the UFW experienced a steep decline in membership due to purges of key organizational leaders. Nationwide unions have been seeking opportunities to enroll Hispanic members. Much of their limited success has been in the hotel industry, especially in Nevada.


Reagan era, 1980s

Dana Cloud argues, "the emblematic moment of the period from 1955 through the 1980s in American labor was the tragic PATCO strike in 1981." Most unions were strongly opposed to Reagan in the 1980 United States presidential election, 1980 presidential election, despite the fact that Reagan remains the only union leader (or even member) to become president. On August 3, 1981, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (1968), Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) union — which had supported Reagan — rejected the government's pay raise offer and sent its 16,000 members out on strike to shut down the nation's commercial airlines. They demanded a reduction in the workweek to 32 from 40 hours, a $10,000 bonus, pay raises up to 40 percent, and early retirement.Herbert R. Northrup, "The Rise and Demise of PATCO", ''Industrial and Labor Relations Review''; 1984 37(2): 167–184 Federal law forbade such a strike, and the United States Department of Transportation implemented a backup plan (of supervisors and military air controllers) to keep the system running. The strikers were given 48 hours to return to work, else they would be fired and banned from ever again working in a federal capacity. A fourth of the strikers came back to work, but 13,000 did not. The strike collapsed, PATCO vanished, and the union movement as a whole suffered a major reversal, which accelerated the decline of membership across the board in the private sector. Schulman and Zelizer argue that the breaking of PATCO, "sent shock waves through the entire U.S. labor relations regime. ... strike rates plummeted, and union power sharply declined." Unions suffered a continual decline of power during the Reagan administration, with a concomitant effect on wages. The average first-year raise (for 1000-plus–worker contracts) fell from 9.8 percent to 1.2 percent; in manufacturing, raises fell from 7.2 percent to negative 1.2 percent. Salaries of unionized workers also fell relative to non-union workers. Women and blacks suffered more from these trends.


Decline of private sector unions

By 2011 fewer than seven percent of employees in the private sector belonged to unions. The UAW's numbers of automobile union members are representative of the manufacturing sector: 1,619,000 active members in 1970, 1,446,000 in 1980, 952,000 in 1990, 623,000 in 2004, and 377,000 in 2010 (with far more retired than active members). By 2014, coal mining had largely shifted to Open-pit mining, open-pit mines in Wyoming, and there were only 60,000 active coal miners. The UMW has 35,000 members, of whom 20,000 were coal miners, chiefly in underground mines in Kentucky and West Virginia. By contrast it had 800,000 members in the late 1930s. However it remains responsible for pensions and medical benefits for 40,000 retired miners, and for 50,000 spouses and dependents.


Rise in union activity (2016 - present)

The number of union members nationwide increased from 2016 to 2017, and some states saw union growth for the first time in several years or decades. Nearly half a million workers went on strike in 2018 and 2019, the largest numbers in three decades. Union growth in 2017 was primarily Millennials, millennial workers. For instance, about 76 percent of new UAW union members during their increase came from workers under the age of 35. Although the total number of union members increased 1.7 percent in 2017, the Economic Policy Institute noted that year-to-year union membership often fluctuates due to hiring or layoffs in particular sectors, and cautioned against interpreting one-year changes as trends. The percentage of the workforce belonging to unions was 10.7 percent in 2017, unchanged over the previous year, but down from 11.1 percent in 2015, and 12.1 percent in 2007. In recent years, efforts have also been made to extend the protections of the
National Labor Relations Act The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and ...
, which excluded domestic workers and Farmworker, farm workers, to those groups on the state level. The National Domestic Workers Alliance, National Domestic Workers' Alliance has successfully advocated for a Domestic Worker's Bill of Rights, Domestic Workers' Bill of Rights in New York, California, and Hawaii, while several states have passed legislation expanding the rights of farm workers. On July 15, 2022, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) reported that the amount of union representation petitions filed with the board increased by 58% in the first three quarters of the 2022 fiscal year. This was more than the total amount of petitions filed in the entire 2021 fiscal year.


Teacher strikes

In 2018, a series of 2018–19 education workers' strikes in the United States, statewide teacher strikes and protests happened garnering nationwide attention due to their success, as well as the fact that several of them were in states where public-employee strikes are illegal. Many of the major strikes were in Republican Party (United States), Republican majority state legislatures, leading to the name "Red State Revolt". Protests were held in 2018 Arizona teachers' strike, Arizona, 2018 Colorado teachers' strike, Colorado, 2018 North Carolina teachers' walkout, North Carolina, 2018 Oklahoma teachers' strike, Oklahoma, and 2018 West Virginia teachers' strike, West Virginia. Additional smaller protests were held in Kentucky and North Carolina. The protests spread to a 2018 DeKalb County School District bus drivers' strike, bus driver strike in the suburbs of Atlanta, Atlanta, Georgia, where nearly 250 bus drivers participated. The strikes included an VCUarts adjunct workers' protests, adjunct faculty strike at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia leading to an increase in adjunct wages.


Unionization in the high tech sector

The relatively new high tech sector, typically dealing with the creation, design, development, and engineering of computer hardware and software products, has typically not been unionized as it is considered white-collar jobs, often with high pay rates and benefits. There has been worker activism to try to get the employer to change their practices related to labor, such as a November 2018 walkout at Google by 20,000 employees to make the company change its policy on sexual harassment. However, these efforts have traditionally stopped short of the need for unionization, and achieving the scale of employee involvement to bring a union to their workplace can be difficult due to the numerous benefits these employees may already have and the blue-collar nature that union association may bring. One area where unionization efforts have become more intense is in the video game industry. Numerous publicized events since 2004 have revealed the excessive use of "Crunch (video games), crunch time" at some companies; where there is a reasonable expectation in the industry that employees may be needed to put in more time near the release of a game product, some companies were noted for using a "crunch time" approach through much longer periods or as a constant expectation of their employees; further, most of those employed in the video game market are exempt from overtime, compounding the issue. Major grassroots efforts through the game industry since 2018 have promoted the creation of a new union or working with an existing union to cover the industry. One of the first high tech companies to establish a union was Kickstarter, whose employees voted in favor of unionizing in February 2020. On April 1, 2022, Amazon (company), Amazon workers at the JFK8 warehouse in Staten Island,
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
voted in favor of a union, becoming Amazon's first unionized workplace in the United States.


Unionization in the food service and grocery industries

The food service industry has one of the lowest unionization rates in the United States, with just 1.2% of workers belonging to a union in 2020 and 2021.


Starbucks

In late 2021, a Starbucks store located in Buffalo, New York became Starbucks' only unionized location among 9,000 stores in the United States, joining Workers United of the Service Employees International Union. A second location in Buffalo followed, winning an election certified by the NLRB in January 2022. During this time, the number of stores filing petitions to the NLRB grew to over ten locations, seven of them being outside of the Buffalo area. The number of Starbucks stores that have decided to vote on unionization has since grown significantly. As of August 2022, 209 Starbucks locations have voted for unionized, with another 45 locations voting against unionization.


Trader Joe's

In late July 2022, workers at a Trader Joe's in Hadley, Massachusetts voted to become the first unionized location in the grocery store chain''.'' Workers at this location chose to create an independent union called Trader Joe's unions, Trader Joe's United, and received administrative and legal support from already existing unions, but decided not to become a part of any larger established union. Two locations, one in Boulder, Colorado, and one in Minneapolis, also filed for unionization around this time. On August 12, 2022, the Minneapolis location went on to become the second store to unionize, joining Trader Joe's United. Comparisons to the unionization efforts of Starbucks locations were made following the success of the Minneapolis vote, with workers of the two respective unions both publicly supporting one another. As of September 23, 2022 workers in Brooklyn, Brooklyn, New York have petitioned for unionization with the NLRB, and would potentially become the third unionized location out of over 500 Trader Joe's stores. Chipotle In late June 2022, a Chipotle Mexican Grill restaurant in Augusta, Maine became the chain's first location to petition for a union election, looking to organize independently as Chipotle United, citing issues regarding understaffing as well as crew and food safety. In that same month, Chipotle decided to permanently close the location, leading to workers filing a complaint with the NLRB and accusing Chipotle of union-busting. Chipotle has denied such claims, and have stated that the company was unable to provide enough staffing for the location. In late August 2022, workers at a Chipotle in Lansing, Michigan voted to unionize, becoming the fast food chain's first union in the United States. Workers at this location voted 11 to three, opting to unionize with the
International Brotherhood of Teamsters The International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT), also known as the Teamsters Union, is a labor union in the United States and Canada. Formed in 1903 by the merger of The Team Drivers International Union and The Teamsters National Union, the un ...
.


Public-sector unions

Labor unions generally ignored government employees because they were controlled mostly by the patronage system used by the political parties before the arrival of civil service. Post Office workers did form unions. The National Association of Letter Carriers started in 1889 and grew quickly. By the mid-1960s it had 175,000 members in 6,400 local branches. Several competing organizations of postal clerks emerged starting in the 1890s. Merger discussions dragged on for years, until finally the NFPOC, UNMAPOC and others merged in 1961 as the United Federation of Postal Clerks. Another round of mergers in 1971 produced the American Postal Workers Union (APWU). In 2012 the APWU had 330,000 members. The various postal unions did not engage in strikes. Historian Joseph Slater, says, "Unfortunately for public sector unions, the most searing and enduring image of their history in the first half of the twentieth century was the Boston police strike. The strike was routinely cited by courts and officials through the end of the 1940s." Governor Calvin Coolidge broke the strike and the legislature took control of the police away from city officials. The police strike chilled union interest in the public sector in the 1920s. The major exception was the emergence of unions of public school teachers in the largest cities; they formed the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), affiliated with the AFL. In suburbs and small cities, the National Education Association (NEA) became active, but it insisted it was not a labor union but a professional organization.


New Deal era

In the mid-1930s efforts were made to unionize Works Progress Administration workers, but were opposed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Moe points out that Roosevelt, "an ardent supporter of collective bargaining in the private sector, was opposed to it in the public sector." Roosevelt in 1937 told the nation what the position of his government was: "All Government employees should realize that the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service.... The very nature and purposes of government make it impossible for administrative officials to represent fully or to bind the employer in mutual discussions with government employee organizations.


"Little New Deal" era

Change came in the 1950s. In 1958 New York mayor Robert F. Wagner Jr., Robert Wagner, Jr. issued an executive order, called "the little Wagner Act," giving city employees certain bargaining rights, and gave their unions with exclusive representation (that is, the unions alone were legally authorized to speak for all city workers, regardless of whether or not some workers were members.) Management complained but the unions had power in city politics. By the 1960s and 1970s public-sector unions expanded rapidly to cover teachers, clerks, firemen, police, prison guards and others. In 1962, President John F. Kennedy issued Executive Order 10988, upgrading the status of unions of federal workers.


Recent years

After 1960, public sector unions grew rapidly and secured good wages and high pensions for their members. While manufacturing and farming steadily declined, state- and local-government employment quadrupled from 4 million workers in 1950 to 12 million in 1976 and 16.6 million in 2009. In 2009, the US membership of public sector unions surpassed membership of private sector unions for the first time, at 7.9 million and 7.4 million respectively. In 2011, states faced a growing fiscal crisis and the Republicans had made major gains in the 2010 United States elections, 2010 elections. Public sector unions came under heavy attack 2011 Wisconsin protests, especially in Wisconsin, as well as Indiana, New Jersey and Ohio from conservative Republican legislatures. Conservative State legislature (United States), state legislatures tried to drastically reduce the abilities of unions to collectively bargain. Conservatives argued that public unions were too powerful since they helped elect their bosses, and that overly generous pension systems were too heavy a drain on state budgets.


Analysis

According to labor historians, the US has the most violent labor history of any industrialized nation. Some historians have attempted to explain why a labor party did not emerge in the United States, in contrast to Western Europe. Historian Gary Gerstle asserts that organized labor in the US was strongest when the fear of communism reached its peak, and the former's decline coincided with the collapse of the latter. Gerstle argues that capitalist elites were much less willing to compromise with the working class once the threat of communism disappeared and neoliberal capitalism became the dominant global system. He emphasizes that this analysis is not meant to rehabilitate communist governments, which he describes as tyrannies.


See also

*
American Federation of Labor The American Federation of Labor (A.F. of L.) was a national federation of labor unions in the United States that continues today as the AFL-CIO. It was founded in Columbus, Ohio, in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions eager to provide mutua ...
(AFL), now
AFL–CIO The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO) is the largest federation of unions in the United States. It is made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 12 million ac ...
* Anti-union violence in the United States *
Congress of Industrial Organizations The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. Originally created in 1935 as a committee within the American Federation of ...
. 1935 to 1955, now
AFL–CIO The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL–CIO) is the largest federation of unions in the United States. It is made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 12 million ac ...
* Communists in the United States labor movement (1937–1950) *Gilded Age *History of labor law in the United States *History of unfree labor in the United States *Immigration policies of American labor unions *International comparisons of trade unions, International comparisons of labor unions *Labor federation competition in the United States *Labor unions in the United States *List of strikes (many in the United States) *Minimum wage in the United States * New Deal coalition *Union violence in the United States *United States labor law


Notes


Bibliography


Surveys

* Arnesen, Eric, ed. ''Encyclopedia of U.S. Labor and Working-Class History'' (2006), 2064pp; 650 articles by experts
excerpt and text search
* Beik, Millie, ed. ''Labor Relations: Major Issues in American History'' (2005) over 100 annotated primary documents
excerpt and text search
* Boone, Graham. "Labor law highlights, 1915–2015." ''Monthly Labor Review'' (2015)
online
* Boris, Eileen, Nelson Lichtenstein, and Thomas Paterson, eds. ''Major Problems in the History of American Workers: Documents and Essays'' (2002); primary and secondary sources. * Brenner, Aaron Brenner et al. eds. ''The Encyclopedia of Strikes in American History'' (ME Sharpe, 2009) 789 pp. * Brody, David. ''In Labor's Cause: Main Themes on the History of the American Worker'' (1993)
excerpt and text search
*Commons, John R. and Associates. ''History of Labour In The United States. [1896–1932]'' (4 vol. 1921–1957), highly detailed classic to 1920
online
* Derks, Scott. ''Working Americans, 1880-1999: The Working Class'' (2000) * Dubofsky, Melvyn. ''Industrialism and the American worker, 1865-1920'' (1975)
online
* Dubofsky, Melvyn. ''Labor Leaders in America'' (1987). * Dubofsky, Melvyn, and Foster Rhea Dulles. ''Labor in America: A History'' (8th ed. 2010); wide-ranging survey * Dubofsky, Melvyn, ed. ''American labor since the New Deal'' (1971)
online
*Faue, Elizabeth. ''Rethinking the American Labor Movement'' (2017)
excerpt
* Fink, Gary M., ed. ''Labor Unions'' (Greenwood Press, 1977
online
* Fink, Gary M., ed. ''Biographical Dictionary of American Labor'' (Greenwood Press, 1984). * Kessler-Harris, Alice. ''Out to work: A history of wage-earning women in the United States'' (Oxford UP, 1982, 2003)
online
* * Minchin, Timothy J. ''Labor under Fire: A History of the AFL-CIO since 1979'' (UNC Press, 2017). * * Perlman, Selig. ''A theory of the labor movement'' (1928)
online
* Taylor, Paul F. ''The ABC-CLIO Companion To The American Labor Movement'' (ABC-CLIO, 1993); an encyclopedia * Zieger, Robert H., and Gilbert J. Gall. ''American Workers, American Unions: The Twentieth Century'' (2002).


Specialized studies

* * Arnesen, Eric. "'Like Banquo's Ghost, It Will Not Down': The Race Question and the American Railroad Brotherhoods, 1880-1920." ''American Historical Review'' 99.5 (1994): 1601–1633
online
* Arnold, Andrew B. ''Fueling the Gilded Age: Railroads, Miners, and Disorder in Pennsylvania Coal Country'' (2014
Excerpt and text search
*Brenner, Aaron et al. ''The Encyclopedia of Strikes in American History'' (2009). * Brody, David. ''Steelworkers in America: The nonunion era'' (U of Illinois Press, 1960). * * Campbell, D'Ann. ''Women at War with America: Private Lives in a Patriotic Era'' (Harvard UP, 1984) women workers in World War II. * DiGirolamo, Vincent
''Crying the News: A History of America's Newsboys''
(2019). * best biography of key 20th century leader * * * Fraser, Steve (2015). ''The Age of Acquiescence: The Life and Death of American Resistance to Organized Wealth and Power.'' Little, Brown and Company. . * * * Grossman, Jonathan
"The Coal Strike of 1902 – Turning Point in U.S. Policy" ''Monthly Labor Review'' October 1975. online
* Gutman, Herbert G. "Work, culture, and society in industrializing America, 1815-1919." ''American Historical Review'' 78.3 (1973): 531-58
online
* Hazard, Blanche E. "The organization of the boot and shoe industry in Massachusetts before 1875." ''Quarterly Journal of Economics'' 27.2 (1913): 236–262
online
* Hill, Herbert. "The problem of race in American labor history." ''Reviews in American History'' 24.2 (1996): 189–208
online
* Isaac, Larry W., Rachel G. McKane, and Anna W. Jacobs. "Pitting the Working Class against Itself: Solidarity, Strikebreaking, and Strike Outcomes in the Early US Labor Movement." ''Social Science History'' 46.2 (2022): 315–348
online
* Josephson, Matthew. ''Sidney Hillman: Statesman of American Labor'' (1952
online
* Kampelman, Max M. ''The Communist Party vs The CIO'' (1957
online
* Kersten, Andrew E. ''Labor's home front: the American Federation of Labor during World War II'' (NYU Press, 2006)
online
* * Lichtenstein, Nelson. ''Labor's War at Home: The CIO in World War II.'' (1987) * Lipold, Paul F., and Larry W. Isaac. "Striking deaths: Lethal contestation and the ‘exceptional’ character of the American labor movement, 1870–1970.” ''International Review of Social History'' (2009) 54 (2): 167–205. * Lipsitz, George. ''Rainbow at Midnight: Labor and Culture in the 1940s.'' (U of Illinois Press, 1994). * * McCartin, Joseph A. ''Collision course: Ronald Reagan, the air traffic controllers, and the strike that changed America'' (2011
online
* Milkman, Ruth, ed. ''Women, work, and protest: a century of US women's labor history'' (Routledge, 2013). * * * Montgomery, David. "Strikes in Nineteenth-Century America," ''Social Science History'' (1980) 4#1 pp. 81–10
in JSTOR
* Phelan, Craig. ''William Green: Biography of a Labor Leader'' (1989), 20th century AFL leader . * Reich, Steven A. ''A Working People: A History of African American Workers since Emancipation'' (2015) * Rodgers, Daniel T. ''The work ethic in industrial America 1850-1920'' (U of Chicago Press, 2014). * Rosenfeld, Jake (2014).
What Unions No Longer Do
'' Harvard University Press. * * * Taillon, Paul Michel. ''Good, Reliable, White Men: Railroad Brotherhoods, 1877-1917'' (U of Illinois Press, 2009). * * Trotter Jr, Joe William. ''Workers on arrival: Black labor in the making of America'' (U of California Press, 2019). * van der Linden, Marcel. ''American Labor's Global Ambassadors: The International History of the AFL-CIO during the Cold War'' (Springer, 2013). * Vargas, Zaragosa. ''Proletarians of the North: A history of Mexican industrial workers in Detroit and the Midwest, 1917-1933'' (Univ of California Press, 1993). * Wilentz, Sean. ''Chants democratic: New York City & the rise of the American working class, 1788-1850'' (1984) iarchive:chantsdemocratic00sean, online *


Historiography

* * Faue, Elizabeth. ''Rethinking the American labor movement'' (Routledge, 2017). * Fink, Leon. '' In Search of the Working Class: Essays in American Labor History and Political Culture'' (1984) * Fink, Leon. "'Intellectuals' versus 'Workers': Academic Requirements and the Creation of Labor History." ''American Historical Review'' 96.2 (1991): 395–421
online
** Fitzpatrick, Ellen. "Rethinking the Intellectual Origins of American Labor History." ''American Historical Review'' 96.2 (1991): 422–428
online
* Krueger, Thomas A. "American labor historiography, old and new." ''Journal of social history'' (1971): 277-28
online
* * * Pearson, Chad. "Twentieth century US labor history: Pedagogy, politics, and controversies Part 1" ''History Compass'' (Dec 2017) 15#2 DOI: 10.1111/hic3.12433
abstract
* Shelton, Jon. "Labor and Working Class—A Historiographical Survey." in ''The Routledge History of the Twentieth-Century United States'' (Routledge, 2018) pp. 149–160. * * * Zieger, Robert H. "Workers and scholars: Recent trends in American labor historiography." ''Labor History'' 13#2 (1972): 245–266. https://doi.org/10.1080/00236567208584204


Primary sources

* Dubofsky, Melvyn, and Joseph McCartin, eds. ''American Labor: A Documentary Collection'' (Palgrave Macmillan US), 2004 312pp *Rees, Jonathan, and Z. S. Pollack, eds. ''The Voice of the People: Primary Sources on the History of American Labor, Industrial Relations, and Working-Class Culture'' (2004), 264pp *Gompers, Samuel. ''Seventy Years of Life and Labor'' (1925, 1985 reprint) *Gompers, Samuel. ''The Samuel Gompers Papers'' (1986– ) definitive multivolume edition of all important letters to and from Gompers. 9 volumes have been completed to 1917. The index i

*Powderly, Terence Vincent. ''Thirty years of labor, 1859–1889'' (1890, reprint 1967).


External links

*
Labor History LinksUnited Farm Workers
official site
Blair Community Center and Museum
to help preserve and understand the largest labor uprising in US history—the Battle of Blair Mountain. {{DEFAULTSORT:Labor History Of The United States Labor history of the United States, History of labor relations in the United States, Social history of the United States, Labor history Industrial Workers of the World in the United States History of the United States by topic