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E Pluribus Unum-The Birth of a United Labor Movement

In the first quarter of the 19th century, several unions campaigning to reduce the workday from 12 hours to 10 considered banding together for the purpose of promoting common goals for working people.

While the number of local union organizations grew at a steady pace during the mid-19th century, several unions in different trades consolidated into citywide federations. In 1834 workers in five cities met in New York City to form the National Trades’ Union, the United States’ first attempt at countrywide unification. This organization, however, was short-lived; the financial panic of 1837 wiped it out. But attempts at unifying the American trade union movement continued.

The National Labor Union arose in Baltimore in 1866 as a confederation of several national trades’ assemblies-printers, machinists, stone cutters, to name a few-rather than national craft organizations. However, this group tended toward social reform rather than trade-union objectives and eventually lost the support of the craftsmen. The death blow was dealt by the economic depression of 1873.

Philadelphia was the location of the founding of the Noble Order of Labor in 1869. Maintaining strict secrecy until 1878, the Knights was comprised of skilled and unskilled workers. In fact, membership was open to all-farmers and small-business people included-except lawyers, bankers, stockbrokers, professional gamblers and persons involved in the sale of alcoholic beverages. Successful railroad strikes against the

Gould lines contributed to the popularity of this organization, which claimed nearly 750,000 members in its heyday. But the skilled and unskilled workers in its ranks became disillusioned with the group’s vague structure, the officers’ dislike for strikes, and the reliance on future social progress rather than building and running a union organization.

Thus, the scene was prepared for the birth of a down-to-earth, pragmatic trade-union federation. One which would lead the battle for long-range working-class objectives as printers, merchant seamen and steel workers, among other trades’ and industries’ representatives, met in Pittsburgh on November 15, 1881, to create the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions. It based its constitution on that of the already-well-established British Trades Union Congress. FOTLU’s principal focus was on legislation; its foremost committee dealt with legislation; and that committee’s chairman was Samuel Gompers of the Cigar Makers Union.

Although this federation wasn’t quite as effective as it wanted to be, it definitely knew the most important matters affecting America’s working class. For example, its leaders passed a resolution asserting that “eight hours shall constitute a legal day’s labor from and after May 1, 1886,” and encouraged its affiliates to direct their organizations to support this goal. Another principle which demonstrated the astuteness of FOTLU’s leaders was the need to abolish the “men only” philosophy of organized labor prevalent at that time. In 1882 the federation welcomed “all women’s labor organizations. . .on an equal footing.” In rather unreserved language the AFL Convention in 1894 adopted this resolution: “Women should be organized into trade unions to the end they may scientifically and permanently abolish the terrible evils accompanying their weakened, unorganized state; and we demand they receive equal compensation with men for equal services performed.”

But still many trade unionists—Gompers, for one, and Peter J. McGuire of the Brotherhood of Carpenters, for another-believed the time was ripe for reorganizing the group and making it more effective. On December 8, 1886, they and some other delegates gathered in Columbus, Ohio, to begin the transformation of the federation into the new American Federation of Labor. The AFL’s 300,000 members in 25 unions faced a disturbing period of discord and struggle. But the new labor group was determined to surmount the challenges facing it from all sides-the public, the police, the militia and the employers-in order to further the goals of American working people.