The International Fur and Leather Workers Union (IFLWU), was a labor union that represented workers in the fur and leather trades.

History

Group of Striking Fur Girls at Picnic, USA 1912

The IFLWU was founded in 1913 and affiliated with the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Radical union organizers, including

Communists Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

, played a role in the union from its early years. They took control using violence in the 1920s, and it became one of the major bases in the labor movement. Irving Howe says that the Communists used: :shock troops, a sort of paramilitary vanguard handy with knives, belts, pikes. The most active radical and long-time Communist

Ben Gold Benjamin Gold (1898–1985) was an American labor leader and Communist Party member who was president of the International Fur and Leather Workers Union (IFLWU) from 1937 to 1955. Early life Ben Gold was born September 8, 1898 to Israel and Sar ...

, was president from 1935 until he was forced out by moderates in the 1940s. In 1937, the IFLWU left the AFL and joined the new Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), led by

John L. Lewis John Llewellyn Lewis (February 12, 1880 – June 11, 1969) was an American leader of organized labor who served as president of the United Mine Workers of America (UMW) from 1920 to 1960. A major player in the history of coal mining, he was the d ...

. In 1948, former CIO general counsel Lee Pressman joined

Joseph Forer Joseph Forer (11 August 1910 – 20 June 1986) was a 20th-century American attorney who, with partner David Rein, supported Progressive causes, including discriminated communists and African-Americans. Forer was one of the founders of the Nation ...

, a Washington-based attorney, in representing Irving Potash, vice president of the Fur and Leather Workers Union along with four others ( Gerhard Eisler, supposedly the top Soviet agent in America; Ferdinand C. Smith, secretary of the

National Maritime Union The National Maritime Union (NMU) was an American labor union founded in May 1937. It affiliated with the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) in July 1937. After a failed merger with a different maritime group in 1988, the union merged wi ...

; Charles A. Doyle of the Gas, Coke and Chemical Workers Union, and John Williamson, labor secretary of the Communist Party USA). On May 5, 1948, Pressman and Forer received a preliminary injunction so their defendants might have hearings with examiners unconnected with the investigations and prosecutions by examiners of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. Between 1949 and 1950, with Cold War tensions rising, the CIO expelled the IFLWU and 10 other unions that it accused of being " communist dominated." In 1955, the union merged into the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America union.

History

Presidents

See also

References

External links

Further reading