Labor Unions & Strikes

How did Labor Unions attempt to improve working conditions?

▪ Capitalism: an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.

= accumulating wealth▪ Socialism: a social system or theory in which the

government owns and controls the means of production (as factories) and distribution of goods.

▪ Communism: an economic system in which the government owns the things that are used to make and transport products and there is no privately owned property

= Sharing the Wealth

What is a Labor Union?

▪ an organization of workers formed for the purpose of fighting to provide workers with better wages, benefits, and working conditions.

▪ Labor Unions used collective bargaining to achieve their goals.

▪ Collective bargaining is a process of negotiation between employees and employers with the goal of reaching an agreement to improve working conditions and salaries.

Knights of Labor• First important national union

• Wanted to organize ALL workers: skilled, unskilled and of all backgrounds (no racial restrictions)

• Set the example: negotiate, then strike if needed

• Goals: 8 hour day; end of child labor

• Lost influence after violent strikes

Other Unions• American Federation of Labor (AFL):

– Smaller local unions with a national organization

– Wages, hours, conditions

– Strikes, collective bargaining

– Barred African-Americans

• Industrial Workers of the World (IWW)Wobblies name for IWW members

Wobblies Socialists and favored a communist system and believed Capitalism was unfair

Railroad Workers Organize❖The Great Railroad

Strike of 1877– Railway workers protested

unfair wage cuts and unsafe working conditions.

– The strike was violent and unorganized.

– President Hayes sent federal troops to put down the

strikes.

−From then on, employers relied on federal and state troops to repress labor unrest.

❖Debs and the American Railway Union

–At the time of the 1877 strike, railroad workers mainly organized into various “brotherhoods,” which were basically craft unions.

–Eugene V. Debs proposed a new industrial union for all railway workers called the American Railway Union (A.R.U.).

–The A.R.U. would replace all of the brotherhoods and unite all railroad workers, skilled and unskilled.

Railroad Workers Organize

•May 3, 1886, joining a nation wide strike for an 8 work day Chicago workers protested against the McCormick Reaper plant.

•A riot broke out and Chicago police officers killed several protesters

•To protest the killing, protesters planned a rally for May 4

• 3,000 gather at Chicago’s Haymarket Square

• During the protest, a bomb exploded

• 7 police officers were killed and civilians killed and injured

• Chicago police hunt down murderers

• 8 anarchists were convicted of conspiracy to murder

• 4 were hung and 1 committed suicide

• This caused the public to look down on labor unions especially the Knights of Labor

• Gov. of Illinois later issued pardons for the remaining accused

•1892, Carnegie Steel workers strike over pay cuts

•Management locks out workers and hires scab workers.

•Violence erupted between strikers and scab workers.

•Pinkerton Security called in to settle violence

•Strikers ambush them and forced Pinkerton’s to walk the gauntlet between striking families.

•Some killed and many injured

•National Guard was called in by the governor of Pennsylvania to stop violence and reopen plant

• Railway car company owned by George Pullman

• Over 6,000 workers

• Workers had lived in “company town”

• Rent was 25% higher than other areas

• Pullman cuts workers’ wages

• But doesnt cut rent for

apartments

• May 10, 1894- Workers

walk out

• President Grover

Cleveland sends in

troops

• Presence of Federal

troops sets off riots

• Rioters burn buildings,

troops kill 4 and

wound 20

• By August, strike fall apart

• 1000 union workers fired

• New workers have to sign contracts promising not to join a

union

• Debs arrested and jailed for 6 months

The Great Strikes• Haymarket Riot (1896)—8 hour workday national

strike; scabs hired in Chicago (fights); rally—bombing & gunfight between police & strikers; Ill. Law: help with murder, then you are a murderer: 4 anarchists hanged for murder (one blew himself up in prison). Never determined who threw the bomb.

• Homestead Strike (1892)—Carnegie Steelworkers called a strike (factory cut their wages) & were fired; management sent in “private” police force (fight with deaths); strike called off

• Pullman Strike (1894): Company town; wages cut 25% (Panic of 1893); food prices in town NOT cut; Pullman fired three negotiators; strike; al RR traffic halted; strike ordered illegal because mail couldn’t get through

Employers’ Reaction• Banned Union Meetings

• Union organizers fired

• Blacklisting

• Yellow Dog contracts (contract that

workers must sign promising not to participate in a union)

• Would not bargain collectively (did not

want to negotiate with workers)

• Strikes were met with violence from bosses who would hire police to stop protests.

Wagner Act (National Labor Relations

Act) (1935)

–Designed to protect employee rights to

form and join unions

–Created the National Labor Relations

Board (NLRB):• Administer certification elections

• Prevent and remedy unlawful acts (unfair labor

practices)

• Identified 5 illegal labor practices

Effects of the Labor

Movement• Unions were not always granted as

legally protected organizations and

gains were limited for more than 30

years.

• Debs became socialist and formed the

American Socialist Party and the

Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) a

radical union group.

Workers Benefits Today

Labor Unions & Strikes

How did Labor Unions attempt to improve working conditions?