trade unions; consequently, during several years following, notwithstanding th

railway brotherhood was the one of the locomotive engineers on the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Company. The strike was begun jointly on February 27, 1888, by the brotherhoods of locomotive engineers and locomotive firemen. The main demands were made by the engineers, who asked for the abandonment of the system of classification and for a new wage scale. Two months previously, the Knights of Labor had declared a miners' strike against the Philadelphia & Reading Railroad Company, employing 80,000 anthracite miners, and the strike had been accompanied by a sympathetic strike of engineers and firemen belonging to the Order. The member

n by a new concerted eight-hour movement manag

ization desirous of expansion might well hitch its wagon to this star. Accordingly, the convention of the American Federation of Labor in 1888 declared that a general demand should be made fo

s. Pamphlets were issued and widely distributed. On every important holiday mass meetings were held in the larger cities. On Labor

y in May 1890, was abandoned in favor of a strike trade by trade. In March 1890, the carpenters wer

the Federation. For several years it had been accumulating funds for the eight-hour day, and, when the movement was inaugurated in May 1890, it ac

and the plan for an eight-hour strike was abandoned. In this manner the eight-hour movement inaugurated by the convention of the Federation in 1888 came to an end. Apart from the strike of the carpenters in 1890, it had not led to any general movement to gain the eight-hour work day. Nevertheless, hundreds of thousands of workingmen had won reduced hours of labor, especially in the

union in the entire history of the American labor movement. Prior to 1889 the relations between the union and the Carnegie firm had been invariably friendly. In January 1889, H.C. Frick, who, as owner of the largest coke manufacturing plant, had acquired a reputation of a bitter opponent of organized labor, became chairman of Carnegie Brothers and Company. In the same year, ow

of conferences were held without result; and on May 30 the company submitted an ultimatum to the effect that, if the scale were not signed by June 29, they would treat with the men as individuals. At a final conference which was held on June 23, the company raised its offer fro

to Homestead, which they approached about four o'clock on the morning of July 6. The workmen had been warned of their coming and, when the boat reached the landing back of the steel works, nearly the whole town was there to meet them and to prevent their landing. Passion ran high. The men armed themselves with guns and gave t

strike. The strike at Homestead was finally declared off on November 20, and most of the men went back to their old positions as

slaught by the modern corporation. The Homestead strike stirred the labor movement as few other single events. It had its political reverberation, since it drove home to the workers that an industry protected by high tariff will not necessarily be a haven to organized labor, notwithstanding that the union had actively assisted the iron and steel manufacturers in se

the power of resistance, but of stability and permanency," and he assigned as the most prominent cause the system of high dues and benefits which had come into vogue in a large number of trade unions. He said: "Beyond doubt the superficial motive of continued membership in unions organized upon this basis was the monetary benefits the members were entitled to; but be that as it may, the results are the same, that is, membership is maintained, the organization r

greater failure. The strike of the coal miners and the Pullman strike were the most important ones. The United Mine Workers began their strike in Ohio on April 21. The membership did not exceed 20,000, but about 125,000 struck. At firs

ndeed against the entire existing social order the full force of a revolutionary labor solidarity embracing the entire American wage-earning class brought to the point of exasperation by unemployment, wage reductions, and misery. That in spit

organized in June 1893, by Eugene V. Debs. Debs, as secretary-treasurer of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, had watched the failure of many a strike by only one trade and resigned this office to organize all railway workers in one organization. The American Railway Union was the result. Between June 9 and June 26 the latter held a convention in Chicago. The Pullman matte

e damages in losses of property and business to the country have been estimated at $80,000,000. On July 7, E.V. Debs, president, and other principal officers of the American Railway Union were indicted, arrested, and held under $10,000 bail. On July 13 they were charged with contempt of the United States Court in disobeying an injunction which enjoined them, among other things, from compelling or inducing by threats railway employes to strike. The strike had already been weakening for some days. On July 12, at the request of the American Railway Union, about twenty-five of the executive officers of national and international labor unions affiliated with the American Federation of Labor met in conference in Chicago to discuss the situation. Debs appeared and urged a general strike by

ined through revolutionary striking, for the government was sufficiently strong to cope

allies of those socialistic and radical leaders inside the Federation who aspired to convert it from a mere

eleven planks of the program demanded: compulsory education; the right of popular initiative in legislation; a legal eight-hour work-day; governmental inspection of mines and workshops; abolition of the sweating system; employers' liability laws; abolition of the contract system upon

itself manifest. Then it took the form of a demand by such conservative leaders as Gompers, McGuire, and Strasser, that plank 10, with its pledge in favor of "the collect

ation. His attitude clearly foreshadowed the destiny of the program at the convention. The first attack was made upon the preamble, on the ground that the statement therein that the English trade unions had declared for independent political action was false. By a vote of 1345 to 861 the convention struck out the preamble. Upon motion of the typographical union, a substitute was adopted calling for the "abolition of t

e union leaders declared publicly for Bryan. President Gompers, however, issued a warning to all affiliated unions to keep out of partisan politics. Notwithstanding this Secretary McGraith, at the next convention of the Federation, charged President Gompers with acting in collusion with the Democratic headquarters

we saw, it had centered on economic or trade-union action during prosperity only to change abruptly to "panaceas" and politics with the descent of depression. Now the movement, notwithstanding

earliest stable trade agreements in a conspicuous trade covering a local field was a bricklayers' agreement in Chicago in 1887, the era of trade agreements really dates from the national system established

rs in practically all other industries at that time, controlled in a large measure their own market. Furthermore, the product had been completely standardized and reduced to a piecework basis, and machinery had not taken the place of the molders' skill. It consequently was no mere accident that the stove industry was the first to d

n of stove manufacturers. The Defense Association aimed at a national labor policy; it was organized for "resistance against any unjust demands of their workmen, and such other purposes as may from time to

sent its patterns to foundries in other districts, but the union successfully prevented their use. This occasioned a series of strikes in the West and of lockouts in the East, affecting altogether about 5000 molders. It continued thus until Jun

ociation. The conference took place March 25, 1891, and worked out a complete plan of organization for the stove molding industry. Every year two committees of three members each, chosen respectively by the union and the association, were to meet in conference and to draw up general laws for the year. In case of a dispute arising in a locality, if the parties immediately concerned were unable to arrive at common terms, the chief executives of both organizations, the president of the union and the president of the association, were to step in and try to effect an adjustment. If, however,

ial disputes. The basic idea of the trade agreement is that of collective bargaining rather than arbitration. The two terms are not always distinguished, but the essential difference is that in the trade agreement proper no outside party intervenes to settle the dispute and make an award. The agreement is made by direct

he labor movement could hardly come to eschew "panaceas" and to reconstitute itself upon the basis of opportunism. The coming in of the tr

TNO

below,