8.2 rise of organized labor - joneshistory.net rise of organized labor... · • avoid strikes –...
TRANSCRIPT
Labor Day's violent beginnings CNNMoney Uploaded on Sep 3, 2010 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPhLKARAve4
New Workplace
– Before: small factories,
family owned, very
personal, good wages
– By 1802:
• Large, crowded factories
• No personal
relationships
• Low wages (skills easily
replaced by machines)
The Workplace
• Boss-worker relationship changed
• Worker easily replaced
• Sweatshop
• Women, children; 12 hour days, 6 days a week
• Maiming and death
Sweatshops: workplace where people labor long hours in poor
conditions for low pay begin to crop up. Most workers were
young women & children
Hazards
Lung damaging dust
Cave-ins
Gas explosions
Molten metal spills
Health problems &
injuries
195 die in Pittsburgh
in one year alone
The Pullman Strike of 1894
Student-created video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y55iBLs6eY Username: D Pyka Published on Jan 1, 2014 Title: “Chey and Ali's Us History project”
Child Labor
Child Labor in the Industrial Revolution moosesarepurple's channel Uploaded on Jun 8, 2010 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2M9i1Wy6IU
Knights of Labor
• Worker tools: slow down; strike
• 1869 – skilled workers form Knights of Labor
• Meeting in secret…
Goals of the Knights of Labor
• Abolition of child and prison labor.
• Abolition of the National Bank.
• Eight-hour workday.
• Equal pay for men and women.
• Increased circulation of greenbacks.
• Prohibition of contract foreign
labor.
• Safety codes in the workplace.
• Worker-owned factories.
• Workers’ cooperatives.
Knights of Labor
• Terence Powderly, 1879
– Opened to unskilled, immigrants, African Americans, women
• Avoid strikes – plan was to win popularity with public
Knights of Labor
1885 – successful
strike against
Missouri pacific RR
to roll back wage
cut (members of,
but not officially K
of L action) – more
join up across
nation
Haymarket Square
• 1886, Haymarket Square, Chicago.
– Strike (members of, but not officially K of L)
– Strikebreakers
– Police
– Day 2 – bomb – anarchists – “Haymarket Riot”
– effect on K of L… Haymarket Martyrs--Origins of International Workers Day Pt 2
atulocal689
Uploaded on Apr 11, 2008
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8w-z8ud_9QU
American Federation of Labor
• Samuel Gompers, 1886, Columbus, OH = new union “AFL”
• Umbrella union connecting little unions
• Wanted: higher wages, shorter hours, better working conditions; collective bargaining
• Most powerful 1886-1910 – still exists
• Limited to skilled, male, white workers
Triangle Tragedy
1911: fire breaks out in Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
(sweatshop in NY city)
– Exits are locked (lockouts for union employees)
– No doors push out (body blocks)
– Fire truck ladders can’t reach windows
– Fire hoses not long enough
– Elevators didn’t work (no one knew)
– Poor/ overwhelmed communications don’t transfer
– Windows on lower floors have bars on them
– Only option….jump!
150 people die
– Result: new safety laws
The Tragedy of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire Brian Ham Published on Mar 12, 2014 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpIWMiT4r6c
“As I looked up there at a window, a young man was
helping girls to leap out. Suddenly one of them put her
arms around him and kissed him. Then he held her out
into space and dropped her. He jumped next.
Thud…dead. Thud…dead” – NY Times March 26th 1911
• Biggest travesty to hit NY until 9/1/2001
Hard Times for Labor
• Economic booms and busts – why??
– Overproduction = layoffs
– 1870-1900 2 major depressions and 2
recessions
– Many violent strikes, esp miners and RR
workers
Hard Times for Labor
– Gov’t sides with owners
– Used Sherman Antitrust Act against
strikers!
– Few Americans supported strikes
– Slow going for organized labor
Management vs. Labor
“Tools” of
Management
“Tools” of
Labor
“scabs”
Pinkertons
lockout
blacklisting
yellow-dog contracts
Collective
Bargaining
informational
picketing
organized
strikes
When Workers Go On
Strike…
• Gov’t usually sided with owners
– Political reasons
– Bribery
– They are the people who are “responsible” for creating economic
booms which the country needs
» Who is actually responsible for turning out production???
• Presidents send in troops/ military/ police to intimidate strikers
• Courts rule against strikers too
To cover losses, owners fired workers
• same cycle repeats…
• Business cycle hurts!
• 1870-1900: 2 major depressions & 3 smaller recessions rock country
Organized Labor Meets Hardship
Over
production
Factories &
Faster Work
Price Drops Layoffs
After Economy
Has a Short Time
to Re-boost…
• Eugene V. Debs
• Founder of the American Railway Union
• 5 time Socialist Party candidate for President of the United States
• imprisoned during World War I for speaking out against the war
Women
• Mother Jones – esp eliminate child labor
• Garment workers unite
• Tragedy at Triangle Shirtwaste factory 1911
Mother Jones 1830-1930
“The Miner’s Angel”
• Mary Harris
Jones.
• Organizer for the
United Mine
Workers.
• Founded the
Social
Democratic Party
in 1898.
• One of the
founding
members of the
I. W. W. in
1905.