A Documentary History of
American Industrial
Society
Volume IX
FOUNDERS OF INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRIAL ASSEMBLY OF NORTH AMERICA, 1864
(From a photograph loaned by T. V. Powderly, Washington, D.C.)
(1) WM. BAILEY, machinist, Missouri. (2) THOMAS C. KNOWLES, ship-carpenter, New York.
(3) GEORGE BURLEY, blacksmith, Indiana. (4) Mr. SINSNICHT, printer, Michigan. (5) WM.
CLAFLIN, carpenter, Missouri. (6) JOHN BLAKE, printer, Illinois. (7) GEORGE WHITHER,
carpenter, Massachusetts. (8) W. H. GUDGEON, ship-carpenter, Ohio. (9) JAMES BOYER,
molder, Kentucky. (10) GEORGE BIGLER, printer, Ohio. (11) ROBT. GILCHRIST, molder.
Kentucky. (12) R. F. TREVELLICK, ship-carpenter, Michigan
A Documentary History of
American Industrial
Society
Edited by John R. Commons
Ulrich B. Phillips, Eugene A. Gilmore
Helen L. Sumner, and John B. Andrews
Prepared under the auspices of the American Bureau of
Industrial Research, with the co-operation of the
Carnegie Institution of Washington
With preface by Richard T. Ely
and introdu&ion by Jphn B. Clark
Volume IX
Labor Movement
Cleveland, Ohio
The Arthur H. Clark Company
1910
COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY
THE ARTHUR H. CLARK CO.
All rights reserved
AMERICAN BUREAU OF INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH
DIRECTORS AND EDITORS
RICHARD T. ELY, PH.D., LL.D., Professor of Political Economy,
University of Wisconsin
JOHN R. COMMONS, A.M., Professor of Political Economy,
University of Wisconsin
JOHN B. CLARK, PH.D., LL.D., Professor of Political Economy,
Columbia University
V. EVERIT MACY, Chairman, New York City
ALBERT SHAW, PH.D., LL.D., Editor, American Review
of Reviews
ULRICH B. PHILLIPS, PH.D., Professor of History and Political
Science, Tulane University
EUGENE A. GILMORE, LL.B., Professor of Law,
University of Wisconsin
HELEN L. SUMNER, PH.D., United States Bureau of Labor
JOHN B. ANDREWS, PH.D., Secretary,
American Association for Labor Legislation
THE DOCUMENTARY HISTORY OF AMERICAN
INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY COMPRISES-
VOL. I Plantation and Frontier, Volume 1,
by Ulrich B. Phillips
VOL. II Plantation and Frontier, Volume 2,
by Ulrich B. Phillips
VOL. Ill Labor Conspiracy Cases, 1806-1842, Volume 1,
by John R. Commons and Eugene A. Gilmore
VOL. IV Labor Conspiracy Cases, 1806-1842, Volume 2,
by John R. Commons and Eugene A. Gilmore
VOL. V Labor Movement, 1820 7 1840, Volume 1,
by John R. Commons and Helen L. Sumner
VOL. VI Labor Movement, 1820-1840, Volume 2,
by John R. Commons and Helen L. Sumner
VOL. VII Labor Movement, 1840-1860, Volume 1,
by John R. Commons
VOL. VIII Labor Movement, 1840-1860, Volume 2,
by John R. Commons
VOL. IX Labor Movement, 1860-1880, Volume 1,
by John R. Commons and John B. Andrews
VOL. X Labor Movement, 1860-1880, Volume 2,
by John R. Commons and John B. Andrews
LABOR MOVEMENT
1860-1880
Selected, Collated, and Edited by
JOHN R. COMMONS, A.M.
Professor of Political Economy
University of Wisconsin
and
JOHN B. ANDREWS, PH.D.
Secretary, American Association for Labor Legislation
New York City
Volume I
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION to Volumes IX and X . . . 19
LABOR MOVEMENT DOCUMENTS, 1860- 1880:
I LABOR CONDITIONS
1 American Mechanics and Immigrants . . -55
2 The Cost of Living . . . . . -67
3 The Sewing Women . . . . .72
4 The Importation of Labor . . . . .74
(a) The American Emigrant Company
(1) Organization
(2) Methods
(3) Advertisements by an agent
(b) The Chinese
(1) To supplement the Negro
(2) To counteract the Knights of St. Crispin
5 Employers' Associations . . . . .91
(a) Foundrymen
(i) Address of the Iron Founders' and Machine Builders'
Association of the Falls of the Ohio
J(z) New England
(3) Michigan
(b) Building Trades
(c) Ship Builders
(d) Railroads
(e) An attempted General Association
II THE NATIONAL LABOR UNION
I Prior Efforts toward National Organization . . 117
(a) The Machinists and Blacksmiths, 1861
(b) The International Industrial Assembly of North
America, 1864
(i) The Call
(a) The Delegates
(3) The Resolutions
(4) The Constitution
14 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
2 Baltimore Congress, August, 1866 . . . .126
(a) Preliminary Conference, March, 1866
(b) Proceedings
(x) Delegates and Officers
(2) Reports of Committees and Resolutions
(c) Address to Workingmen
3 Chicago Congress, 1867 . . . . .169
(a) Delegates
(b) Reports of Officers
(c) Constitution
(d) Platform and Political Action
(e) Eight Hours and Public Employment
(f) Negro Labor
(g) Public Lands and Agriculture
(h) Apprentices
(i) Mechanics' Lien
(j) Local Unions, etc.
(k) Election of Officers
4 New York Congress, 1868 . . . . -195
(a) Delegates
(b) Reports of Officers
(c) Constitution
(d) Politics
(e) Cooperation
(f) Protection and Immigration
(g) Accidents
(h) Department of Labor and Census Statistics
(i) Miscellaneous Resolutions Officers
5 Philadelphia Congress, August 16-23, 1869 . . 228
(a) Delegates
(b) "Platform of the Labor Reform Party"
(c) Resolutions and Officers
(1) Hours of Labor
(2) Conspiracy Laws
(3) Southern Labor
(4) Labor Statistics
6 The National Colored Labor Convention, 1869 . . 243
(a) As seen by a white labor unionist
(b) Platform and Memorial to Congress
nine] CONTENTS 15
7 Cincinnati Congress, August 15-22, 1870 . . . 257
(a) Delegates
(b) Reports of Officers
(c) The Constitution
(d) Platform, Resolutions, and Officers
8 St. Louis Congress, 1871 ..... 270
9 Political Convention and Industrial Congress, 1872 . . 272
III IRA STEWARD AND THE HOURS OF LABOR
Introduction ....... 277
1 The First Effort, 1863 . . . . .279
2 "A Reduction of Hours an Increase of Wages" . . 284
3 Plan of Action ...... 302
4 "The Power of the Cheaper over the Dearer" . . 306
5 The First State Law . . . . . 330
IV INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS
1 The National Labor Union and the International Working-
men's Association ...... 333
(a) Proceedings of the National Labor Congress
(b) Sylvis and the International
(c) The Delegate to Basle
2 The International in America . . . . 351
(a) Central Committee of the North American Federation
of the International Workingmen's Association
(b) An International Trade Union
(c) A Nationalized International: The United Workers
of America, 1874
ILLUSTRATIONS
FOUNDERS OF INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRIAL ASSEMBLY OF
NORTH AMERICA, 1864 . . . Frontispiece
From a photograph loaned by T. V. Powdcrly, Washington, D.C.
TYPICAL TITLE PAGES OF LABOR PAPERS OF THE CIVIL WAR
PERIOD . . . . . . .91
PORTRAIT OF JOHN SINEY . . ' . .143
PORTRAIT OF O. H. KELLEY . . . . . 143
PORTRAIT OF EDWARD H. ROGERS . . . . 143
PORTRAIT OF ANDREW C. CAMERON . . . .143
PORTRAIT OF RICHARD F. TREVELLICK . . .211
PORTRAIT OF WILLIAM H. SYLVIS AND JONATHAN C. FINCHER 211
PORTRAIT OF AUGUSTA LEWIS (TROUP) . . .211
PORTRAIT OF ALEXANDER TROUP . . . .211
PORTRAIT OF THOMAS PHILLIPS . . . .281
PORTRAIT OF IRA STEWARD . . . . .281
PORTRAIT OF JOHN SAMUEL ..... 281
PORTRAIT OF GEORGE E. McNEiLL 281
INTRODUCTION TO VOLUMES IX AND X
When Sartorius von Waltershausen, in 1886, pub-
lished his book on American labor organizations, 1 he was
impressed by the unmitigated struggle over the distribu-
tion of wealth. A nation without a military class, with-
out a bureaucracy, without an educated professional
class, without a leisured class on fixed incomes, appeared
to him incapable of disinterested judgment or concilia-
tory influence in the war of mere money-getting. But
von Waltershausen happened to look in upon us at just
that particular time when the tidal wave of the Civil
War was receding from the fields of industry, and the
work of economic and social reconstruction had only
begun again where it had been abandoned thirty years
before. Certainly the observant American of to-day,
whose span of life permits his memory to recall the
events of the sixties, is not disturbed by the assertions of
an increasing class struggle; for he remembers the time
when the economic struggle was bitter and unrelieved
by sober public opinion. And, to the speculative reader
or historian, who has followed the wave of humanita-
rianism and social reform through our volumes of the
thirties and forties, and has there seen it' suddenly dis-
appear in the slavery contest, the question must occur:
what might have been the present condition of American
democracy if there had been no race issue and its irre-
pressible conflict? For he could but have observed that,
1 Die nordamerikanischen Gewerkschaften unter dem Einftuss der fort-
schreitenden Productionstechnik (Berlin, 1886), pp. vii, ff.
20 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
notwithstanding the absorption of Americans in the
struggle for wealth, there was emerging in the forties a
class of idealists and a spirit of social progress more
promising even than those of other nations. This ideal-
ism was exhausted in the Civil War, and it needed an-
other generation to come upon the scene and to learn
anew the social problems which the intervening years
had intensified. Truly, it was not the absorption of
Americans in money-getting that suppressed their ideal-
ism and public spirit, but rather the fulfillment of their
idealism through the misfortune of war that left the
field to money-getting. The present generation has seen
the rebirth of this spirit of progress. But the decades
of the sixties and seventies saw an upstart plutocracy and
a frenzied democracy. Where now is serious effort to
understand and obviate their conflict, there was then
astute aggravation of it.
If we inquire into the industrial conditions under-
lying this clash of interests, we may characterize the
period of 1860 to 1880 as preeminently the middleman-
period. The merchant-capitalist, who dominated in-
dustry after the decade of the thirties, now becomes,
more accurately speaking, the merchant-jobber. 2 The
latter, unlike his predecessor, does not own the raw
material nor the "manufactory," and does not employ
"contractors" to work up the material ; but he buys the
"finished product" from the scattered manufacturers,
farmers, and other producers, and sells it again to man-
ufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers. The immediate
cause of this development is the enormous extension of
the market through the railway and the correspondingly
wide separation of producers. These producers are as
2 Se "Industrial Stages," vol. iii, 18, 29, 51, 54. The "sixth" stage is there
designated as merchant-capitalist, but the term "merchant-jobber," as here de-
fined, describes more nearly the situation.
nine] INTRODUCTION
21
yet without capital, and without the credit to command
capital. They are unable even adequately to equip
their farms and factories, much less to command the
commercial capital needed to market their products.
Even the railroads are subject to the middlemen. Poor-
ly equipped local lines, springing up by the aid of local
capital and subsidies, sufficient though they were to dis-
tribute producers over the free lands of the west, were
not sufficient to afford the through shipments thereby
required. Consequently the railroad industry itself
became a field for exploitation by middlemen ; and there
arose a multitude of companies purchasing transporta-
tion at wholesale from disconnected railway companies
and selling it at retail to the unorganized producers.
Thus arose the through-freight lines, the tank-car lines,
the express companies, the elevator and warehouse com-
panies -these necessary jobbers of transportation when
railroads were in their infancy, but surviving to-day as
giant parasites when railroads are consolidated.
Thus the merchant-jobber, marketing both farm and
factory products and railroad services, performed a
needful work at this stage of the markets. But his power
was accidentally enhanced by the contingencies of war.
Through army contracts and practical politics large
numbers were enriched, and still larger numbers through
the rise of prices that followed the greenback.
With the growth of the middleman-jobber appeared
a new kind of capital -"intangible" capital, based on
market opportunities and access to customers. In the
retail-shop stage there had emerged the modest begin-
ning of "good-will." But in that stage good-will, both
in law and in fact, was identical with situation. It was
merely the probability that customers would Yesort to
the old stand. But with the incoming of wholesale
22 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
merchants, good-will, in all its varieties of business con-
nections, separated itself from the shop and attached it-
self to the trade-name. The merchant-capitalist, who
had established his reputation and his connections with
retailers, producers, and contractors, had an intangible
asset of good-will worth more perhaps to him than the
value of all his tangible property. When to this was
added the reputation of a line of goods, and courts and
legislatures gave protection to trade-marks, then intan-
gible capital reached its perfect fruit. The railroads, too,
and their peculiar middlemen were typical forms of the
new era when the value of physical things was yielding
to the value of market control. In this predicament the
actual manufacturer or producer, with his tangible cap-
ital of farm or factory, was compelled to reach a market
through the jobber's intangible capital of trade connec-
tions. Most of all, this intangible capital was the effec-
tive security for banking and loan credits, through which
the merchant could command the products of labor and
physical capital. Thus it was that the fundamental
question for farmers and wage-laborers in the period
following the Civil War was the control of capital and
credit by middlemen; and the remedies sought were
designed to give control of both to these producers of
tangible products.
The immediate cause of the organization of wage-
labor was the rise of prices and cost of living, which
began with the disappearance of gold and the appear-
ance of greenbacks in 1862. There was in that and in
the preceding years practically no organization of labor
in the United States. Four national unions had a nom-
inal existence, but the panic and depression of 1857 had
nearly eliminated the local unions that existed before.
The effect of paper currency was first seriously noticed
nine] INTRODUCTION 23
toward the end of 1862; but the great stimulus to busi-
ness and the enlistment of wage-earners in the army had
brought about such an increase of employment that the
need of organization was not felt. The situation was
different in 1863, and the failure of wages to rise with
prices provoked the sporadic organization of local un-
ions.
The rise and fall of a labor movement is marked by
the rise and fall of the labor press. Indicated by this
measure, June, 1863, was the beginning of conscious
organization, for at that date Jonathan C. Fincher be-
gan the publication of his Trades' Review at Philadel-
phia. This was truly a national organ, and within two
years it had a circulation in all industrial centers, and
disappeared only as a multitude- of special or local or-
gans displaced it.
Soon these local unions came together in city central
bodies or "trades' assemblies," the new name for the
"trades' unions" of the thirties.* The first one was or-
ganized at Rochester, N.Y., in March, 1863, and thirty
of them were organized before the end of 1865. Their
object was almost solely that which at the present day
would be known as the boycott, although occasionally
they made appeals for financial help for striking unions.
Finally in September, 1864, when the membership
of the unions was estimated at two hundred thousand,
the trades' assemblies endeavored to form a national,
or rather the International, Industrial Assembly of
North America. The uppermost questions in this first
national gathering were strikes, the store-order or truck
system of paying wages, cooperation, prison labor, and
woman's work. The subject of hours of labor, which
held the leading place two years later, was suggested but
* See volume v, p. 21.
24 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
the subject of government loans in legal-tender currency,
which held the leading place three years later, was not
mentioned in the resolutions of this convention of 1864.
Indeed, it was not until the end of the war and the
return of the soldiers to seek employment that reduction
of hours became the leading issue; and it was not until
the contraction of the currency and the fall of prices
that government loans and the greenback displaced
other issues.
HOURS OF LABOR
Meanwhile, in Boston, a machinist and wage-earner,
Ira Steward, had begun to formulate what may be called
the first philosophy springing from the American Labor
Movement. The importance of Steward's contribu-
tion, in giving shape and justification to American la-
bor's most characteristic demand, can not be overesti-
mated and has not been fully recognized. The signifi-
cance of his contribution can only be comprehended by
contrasting his with other theories of wages, and by
placing the short-hour movement of the sixties in its
historical relation to the movements before and after
the sixties.
Steward's doctrine, like that of his greater contem-
porary, Karl Marx, is explicitly a "class-conscious," or
perhaps wage-conscious, doctrine. It is based on the
permanency of the wage-system as such. Consequently,
both Steward and Marx set themselves unswervingly
against all reforms bent on giving to labor the owner-
ship and control of capital, or on strengthening the
position of the small property-owner. They were
equally opposed to cooperation and to anarchism; to
banking reform and to greenbackism ; to all alliances
with middle-class parties. But, while Karl Marx,
logically true to the prevailing theories of the age, saw
nine] INTRODUCTION 25
only the increasing degradation and misery of labor,
and therefore only an ultimate revolution ushering in
the commonwealth, Steward saw the increasing eleva-
tion of labor and the gradual absorption of capital
through the increase of wages at the expense of profits.
Marx started with the wage-fund theory of the dom-
inant political economy. This set the limit of wages at
the amount of capital in the hands of employers, and
predicated the increase of individual wages only on
condition that capital be allowed to accumulate freely
and labor be persuaded to multiply moderately. Stew-
ard rejected this theory, and boldly asserted the extreme
doctrine that wages do not depend upon the amount of
capital and the supply of labor, but upon the habits,
customs, and wants of the working classes. This might
have been accepted by the classical economists 8 in so far
as it held that workingmen with higher wants postpone
the age of marriage and reduce the number of children,
thereby restricting the increase of the working popula-
tion. But Steward was impatient of this physiological
delay. He saw a more direct and pyschological route
from wants to wages, but with a proviso: the competi-
tion of low standards of life with high standards of life
must be eliminated. This could be brought about by a
simple bit of legislation -a general Eight-hour Law for
all classes of labor. Such a law would operate in a two-
fold direction. It would compel the low-standard labor-
er, who already can barely live on his ten and twelve-
hour wages, to demand the same daily wage for eight
hours; and it would afford the leisure which alone can
improve the habits, broaden the opinions, and multiply
the wants of the laborer. Thus a reduction of hours, if
3 John Stuart Mill is not to be included here, since he recognized both the
physiological and the psychological factors.
26 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
general, instead of reducing the day's wage, will actually
increase it.
This doctrine was nearly as revolutionary as that of
Karl Marx. It reversed the theory of the older trade-
unionism, which, taking its logic from the wage-fund
theory, concluded that the way to increase wages was to
restrict the number of laborers and the output of each.
But Steward's doctrine was one of increasing consump-
tion and therefore increasing production through in-
creasing machinery. It was a doctrine of optimism and
enthusiasm, rather than pessimism and revolution. Its
effect on working-class opinion, following the Civil
War, was far reaching. Eight-hour Leagues sprang up
almost as extensively as trade unions. The National
Labor Union in 1866 placed eight hours at the head of
its program, deprecating at the same time trade unions
and strikes. Within two years several municipal coun-
cils, five state legislatures, and the federal government
had adopted the eight-hour law. Although Steward
failed to secure general legislation in all states, the
trade-unions made his doctrine their basic one; and to-
day, among American wage-earners, whether organized
or unorganized, as distinguished from immigrant wage-
earners, Steward's doctrine is the instinctive philosophy.
Their willingness to accept reduction of wages along
with reduction of hours, has often been justified in the
early recovery of the former wages for the reduced
hours. Employers accept it and resist a reduction of
hours more than an increase of wages, for they feel, as
Steward himself said, that resistance to an increase of
wages after hours have been reduced "would amount to
the folly of a strike by employers themselves against the
strongest power in the world, viz., the habits, customs,
and opinions of the masses."
nine] INTRODUCTION 27
Ira Steward was unable to complete the book to which
he had devoted the later years of his life, and, prior to
his death in 1883, he consigned his notes and manuscript
to his friend and disciple, George Gunton, who worked
it out with certain variations in his Wealth and Prog-
ress, published in 1887. Gunton gives Steward credit
for the central and original thought. 4 Indeed, Stew-
ard's forte was neither the orderly nor the inductive de-
velopment of a system of thought, but a keen observation
of his fellow-mechanics. His mind was focused on their
desires, wants, and modes of living, and he gave to these
the commanding position of importance.
It is not an accident that the period from 1860 to
1880, with its gigantic upheavals and its diametric con-
trasts, should have produced the two characteristic but
opposite ideas which the American labor movement
has contributed to labor philosophy. Ira Steward, the
machinist of Boston, in the beginning of the sixties, did
4 Gunton made the psychological doctrine of wages even more optimistic
than Steward had done. Where Steward emphasized the depressing effect on
wages of low-standard competitors, Gunton emphasized the elevating effect of
high standards. On the other hand, Gunton is more nearly true to history,
while Steward is more doctrinaire. Steward would adopt at once a universal
eight-hour law with its quasi-compulsory elevation of the standard; but Gun-
ton holds that shortening the hours in advance of increasing the wants would
result in idleness and not in useful employment of leisure. Steward, retaining
a remnant of the wage-fund theory, conceded that rising wages might ultimately
absorb profits and even rent. But this was his concession to the prevailing en-
thusiasm for cooperation, which he held could not be realized until capital had
lost its vitality through deprivation of profits. His really emphatic point, often
reiterated, was the immense increase in production that would result from
machinery and inventions stimulated by high wages. It was this that
Gunton seized upon, holding that profits and rents would increase with wages,
leading, not to cooperation, but to the greatest invention of all, the "trust."
Steward was indifferent to free trade, free immigration and trade unions, pro-
vided the hours of all could be shortened ; but Gunton required protection,
hinted at restriction of immigration, and proclaimed the agitating influence of
trade unions as a means of multiplying wants. See Gunton s Wealth and
Progress (1886), 88-98, 187-204, 241-251, 266-284; Gunton's Principles of
Social Economics (1891), 339-342, 353-357, 427-430.
28 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
for the subjective facts of wages what Henry George,
the printer of San Francisco, at the end of the seventies,
did for the objective facts. 5 Each in his way was a
thinker of one idea. Steward saw the habits, customs,
and opinions of his fellow-workmen; George saw their
opportunities for employment. Steward saw the im-
mense productivity of Nature's forces, when controlled
by the human mind in the form of capital ; George saw
the dependence of both capital and labor on access to
Nature's resources. Steward saw that wages were de-
termined by the standard of living; George, that the
standard of living was determined by wages. Steward
saw that the menace to high wages was the competition
of the man with the lowest wants ; George saw that this
menace was the competition of the man with the poorest
opportunities. Steward would raise wages by multi-
plying wants ; George, by multiplying opportunities.
Steward would require men to quit working long hours
in order to acquire more wants than their wages would
satisfy; George would require them to quit holding
more resources than they could utilize. Steward would
have the laborer absorb profit, interest and rent by the
pressure of higher wages ; George would have the labor-
er join with the employer and the capitalist to appro-
priate the landlord's surplus.
The theories of each grew out of the circumstances
under which he lived and worked. Steward saw the
settled mechanics and laborers of the most highly devel-
oped manufacturing center of the east, where capital
was abundant, machinery efficient, and culture idolized.
George saw the rush of labor to the westernmost fron-
tier, where capital and culture were scarce, and wages
rose amazingly with every new gold discovery, but sank
5 Progress and Poverty, first published in 1879.
nine] INTRODUCTION 29
correspondingly as labor fell back against the excessive
land monopoly of California. In his environment of
manufacturing wealth, with its possibilities of produc-
tion, Steward instinctively rejected the wage-fund the-
ory and its treatment of labor as a domesticated com-
modity, and exalted the personality theory. But George,
seeing labor about him the mere plaything of tremen-
dous natural and legal forces, just as sensibly turned for
his law of wages to labor's dependence on Nature's re-
sources.
The two theories are not contradictory -they are com-
plementary, just as the action and reaction of man and
environment are complementary. Indeed, modern eco-
nomics, with its "diminishing increments," its "marginal
laborer," and its "marginal uses of land," is endeavoring
more or less to reconcile them. The common principle
of the two theories is their recognition of the equalizing
effect of competition, dragging the higher down to-
wards the level of the marginal competitor. In this they
differ from the labor theory of Karl Marx, originating
in the same period of universal philosophies, but spring-
ing from European conditions. With Marx differences
in wages were not important, and he reduced all labor
to the statistical fallacy of the "average social labor."
Consequently it was not the marginal competitor who
menaced both employer and employee and pulled both
down to his unhappy level, but it was the domination of
capital that robbed and exploited all laborers alike. It
was on account of this unreal and artificial theory, alien
to American experience and thought, that Marxian so-
cialism did not here gain a footing, although zealously
propagated after 1 870. In this land of abundant natural
and created resources a moderate policy of rerief against
unfair competition, which characterized not only the
30 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
theories of Steward and George, but also the practices
of trade-unionism and protectionism, needed not to look
in despair toward a doctrine of exploitation and revolu-
tion.
Nevertheless, there was a field where the eight-hour
philosophy and the socialist philosophy might stand to-
gether against other theories. This was discovered
when, in 1878, the original Boston contingent of Stew-
ard and his disciples, McNeill and Gunton, united with
F. A. Sorge, the leading Marxian socialist, and J. P.
McDonnell, the Fenian member of the International
Workingmen's Association, to found the International
Labor Union. This is seen in the "Declaration of Prin-
ciples" of the latter organization. 6 Both agreed on the
future permanence of the wage-system, and hence this
new International was a protest against alliance with
the greenbackism of the small capitalist, or with the co-
operationism of the self-sacrificing wage-earner. While
Marx asserted the injustice of interest and profit, Stew-
ard predicted their innecessity ; and consequently Marx's
followers could subscribe to Steward's idea that, when
wages shall represent the earnings and not the necessities
of labor, then profit would "melt out of existence" and
cooperation would be "the natural and logical step from
wages slavery to free labor." Marx and Steward agreed
on the reduction of hours as the first step, though Marx
regarded it as a means and Steward as the end.
Ira Steward's philosophy, like that of Karl Marx and
that of Henry George, was a product of the wage-con-
scious period of labor. It was the period when steam
transportation had begun its leveling influence through-
out the world. Wage-earners, thrown suddenly into
competition with each other, awoke to their community
6 Printed in McNeill's Labor Movement, 161.
nine] INTRODUCTION
of economic interest, distinct and separate from their
other interests of locality, nationality, race, religion,
and language, which hitherto had affiliated them to
other classes. In this way Steward's philosophy gave a
new turn and marked a new stage in the American move-
ment for reducing the hours of labor. Prior to 1825 the
hours were those of agriculture, from "sun to sun," and
the wage-earning class of the towns accepted implicitly
this farmer's boundary of the working day. But, after
the extension of the suffrage in the twenties, a new ob-
ligation and a new sense of exclusion from their share
in government dawned upon them, and the argument
advanced for shorter work was that of leisure for educa-
tion and citizenship. This citizenship period was suc-
ceeded in the forties by the humanitarian period, when
the wasteful and anarchic conditions of production and
competition called forth those remote and Utopian
schemes of universal cooperation where capital would
cheerfully join in mitigating the harsh conditions of
labor. More worldly-wise than the humanitarians, the
infant manufacturers now hurried up with protection-
ism, and realized upon the awakened interest in labor.
The trade unions that followed in the fifties, unable to
wait on the tardy conversion of capitalism or the pater-
nalism of manufacturers, and rather taking their cue
from the wage-fund theory that bolstered capitalism,
put forth the argument that shorter hours would make
more work and thereby more wages. This wage-fund
period of the skilled unions, with its disregard of the un-
skilled and unorganized, gave way to the class-conscious
period of the sixties and seventies, when the common in-
terests of all wage-earning labor as such, regardless of
skill, privilege, or power of organization, became the
watchword of labor. It was this that inspired Ira Stew-
32 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
ard to his remedy of universal legislation with its quasi-
compulsory elevation of the standard of living.
But universal philosophies lose their universality in
practice. True, at points of least resistance they get
themselves enacted, but this partial success is a total fail-
ure, viewed as a scheme to elevate an entire class. Where
the politician could yield to the labor vote without jeo-
pardizing the capitalists' support, as in municipal and
federal employment, or where he could satisfy the child-
like faith of labor by a law unconstitutional or unen-
forcible, there the eight-hour scheme of Steward earned
an empty success. But his basic philosophy lived on and
became the spirit of a new trade-unionism, which, grad-
ually abandoning the restrictions of the older unionism,
has struggled through collective bargaining to share
with employers the fruits of invention and machinery.
Imposed upon this trade-agreement period has come,
within the past dozen years, what may be called the in-
dustrial-hygiene period. Here it is not general legisla-
tion favoring an entire economic class, but special legis-
lation based on a classification of industries, occupa-
tions, and workers, according to the degree of menace to
health through long hours. This principle, finally estab-
lished by the Supreme Court in 1898, when an eight-
hour law for men in mines and smelters was sustained
as a reasonable exercise of the police power, 7 furnishes
the solid ground, not of a class-conscious demand, but of
a scientific regulation according to the varying needs of
the general welfare.
Thus it is that the movement for reduced hours of
labor, covering the century since industrial labor first
separated itself from agriculture, has accumulated the
typical arguments of each succeeding period, and today
7 Holden v. Hardy, 169 U.S. 366.
nine] INTRODUCTION 33
confronts the nation as the most pressing of all demands
on behalf of labor. For the arguments of each period
retain a special truth. Leisure for education and citizen-
ship is essential when workers are voters. Humanitari-
anism is more effective, now that it is better guided by
knowledge of what is practicable. Trade unions can
point to the enormous increase of wealth which permits
them to take a larger amount without reducing the
amount taken by others. Protectionism makes its final
stand on the labor-cost of production. Special legisla-
tion proceeds wherever investigation shows that health
is menaced. And, finally, the inequality of bargaining
power under the menace of low-standard competitors -
the residual truth of the class-conscious theory- affords
the ultimate support for interfering with the laborers'
illusive liberty of contract.
GREENBACKISM
Of all the drastic doctrines and revolutionary move-
ments thrown up by the sixties and seventies the most
puzzling and American was greenbackism. What the
socialism of Lassalle and Marx was to Germany, the
cooperative anarchism of Proudhon to France, the rev-
olutionary anarchism of Bakunin to Spain, Italy, and
Russia, what Fenianism was to Ireland, and land na-
tionalization to England, so was greenbackism to Amer-
ica. The originator of greenbackism was Edw r ard Kel-
logg, a merchant of New York. His book, Labor and
Other Capital, was practically contemporary with
Marx's Communist Manifesto, Proudhon's What Is
Property? and also Louis Blanc's L' organisation du
travail, from which Lassalle borrowed his program.
Each of these doctrines was formulated in the forties
on the same theory of capital and labor, and each was
caught up in the sixties on similar movements. After
34 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
1861 several reprints of Kellogg 7 s book were published. 8
Although more fanciful than its European contempor-
aries, greenbackism was more successful, for it left its
permanent contribution to American political economy
in the legal-tender paper currency. But greenbackism,
as provoked by the conditions of the sixties, was more
than currency -it was industrial revolution. In fact,
"Greenbackism" passed through two stages, the first,
that of the National Labor Union, 1867 to 1872; the sec-
ond, that of the Greenback Labor Party after 1873. The
first was based on a theory of capital, interest, and credit ;
the second on a theory of money and prices. The two
stages are distinguished by a double use of the phrase
"value of money." In the first stage this meant the rate
of interest on a loan of money representing capital. In
the second stage it meant the general level of prices of
commodities. In this first stage of its career, the green-
back theory was the American counterpart of the rad-
icalism of Europe. In its theory of capital and interest
it was socialism and anarchism ; in its theory of money
and exchange, Proudhon's anarchism; in its scheme of
administration it was the socialism of Louis Blanc and
Lassalle; only in politics and law was it American. 9 It
8 The original title in full was "Labor and Other Capital ; the Rights of
Each Secured and the Wrongs of Both Eradicated. Or, an exposition of the
cause why few are wealthy and many poor, and the delineation of a system,
which, without infringing the rights of property, will give to labor its just re-
ward. New York, 1849." The reprints after 1861 bore the title, "A new
monetary system respecting the rights of Labor and Property." These were
edited by Kellogg's daughter, Mary Kellogg Putnam, afterward delegate to
the National Labor Congress. A widely circulated popularization and adapta-
tion of Kellogg was published in 1868 by A. Campbell, under the title "The
True Greenback, or the way to pay the national debt without taxes, and
emancipate labor."
9 The term "greenbackism" as used in the text indicates the first stage, and
differs therefore from the meaning hitherto associated with it. See platform
of National Labor Union, 1867; Knox, J. J. United States Notes (New York,
1888) ; Mitchell, W. C. A History of the Greenbacks (Chicago, 1902).
nine] INTRODUCTION 35
took its peculiar American form according to the
American stage of industry at the time and the American
system of government. Where the merchant-capitalist
stage brought forth anarchism in France, Fourierism in
America of the forties, and the socialism of Blanc and
Lassalle in France and Germany, and where the factory
stage suggested Marxian socialism, so the intermediate
merchant-jobber stage in America of the sixties pro-
duced greenbackism. And, as anarchism, nihilism, and
Fenianism in Spain, Italy, Russia, and Ireland were the
desperate doctrines of unfranchised peasantry rackrent-
ed by landlordism; while the anarchism of Proudhon
was the despondent doctrine of mechanics disfranchised
by a usurper; while Marxian socialism was an economic
philosophy suited to unite wage-earners in a struggle
for the suffrage; so greenbackism was a doctrine of
universal suffrage of wage-earner and farmer.
The animus of the doctrine was the effort to take away
from bankers and middlemen their control over govern-
ment and credit, and thereby to furnish credit and cap-
ital through the aid of government to the producers of
physical products. In this respect the program agreed
with that of Lassalle, who would have government lend
its credit to cooperative associations of working men ;
but it differed from Lassalle's in that, while he invoked
the aid of monarchy and nobility against bankers and
capitalists, greenbackism relied upon universal suffrage.
It differed also from the scheme of Lassalle, in that it
would utilize the government's enormous war debt, in-
stead of its taxing power, as a means of furnishing cap-
ital to labor. This was to be done by making the bonds,
bearing three per cent interest, convertible into legal-
tender currency not bearing interest, and making the
currency convertible back into bonds, at the will of the
36 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
holder of either. In other words, the greenback cur-
rency, instead of being, as it was at the time, an irredeem-
able promise to pay in specie, would be redeemable in
government bonds. On the other hand, if a government
bond-holder could secure slightly more than three per
cent by lending to a private borrower, he would return
his bonds to the government, take out the corresponding
amount of greenbacks, and loan it to the producer on his
private note or mortgage. This would involve, of
course, the possible inflation of legal-tender currency to
the amount of the outstanding bonds. But inflation was
immaterial, since all prices would be affected alike ; and
meanwhile the farmers, the working men, and their co-
operative establishments would be able to secure capital
at slightly more than three per cent instead of the nine
or twelve per cent which they were compelled to pay to
the banks. Thereby they would be placed on a compet-
ing level with the middlemen.
According to the theory underlying this scheme, like
the theories of socialism and anarchism, capital was
solely the product of labor. It contained no independ-
ent power of production and deserved no reward of ab-
stinence. Labor alone - physical, mental, and manager-
ial -was entitled to the whale product. The nominal
interest allowed by greenbackism was a compromise
based on what labor could afford to pay, not on the
justice of the payment.
This labor-cost theory of value, so fundamental in the
movements of the sixties, was revolutionary only in the
use made of it. It bore the sanction of Adam Smith and
Ricardo, and had been confirmed rather than weakened
by the effort of Senior to elevate the abstinence of the
capitalist to the same dignity as the sacrifice of the la-
borer. Consequently, when in the sixties, in Europe and
nine] INTRODUCTION 37
America, the demand of labor for the whole product
became the flag of revolt, it fell, not beneath the logic,
but beneath the power, of capital.
That which forced the issue of the labor theory was
the new importance of capital and credit under the
world-wide extension of markets dominated by the mer-
chant-capitalist and the merchant-jobber. On the one
side, the political economists were impressed by the
scarcity of capital and the imperfection of the credit
mechanism for assembling capital in the hands of the
most efficient. On the other side, the labor theorists
were impressed by the power of capital over producers.
Here it was that socialism separated from anarchism
and greenbackism. Karl Marx, just as he merged all
classes of labor into a definition of "average social la-
bor," merged land, capital, and credit into a definition
of capital. Credit was merely a transaction between ex-
ploiters, and there were only two classes, the propertied
and the unpropertied. But anarchism and greenback-
ism were doctrines of the small shopkeeper, the master-
mechanic, the farmer or the skilled journeyman, work-
ing with his own tools, on his own farm, in his own shop
or home. To him, his physical capital is not something
external and independent, but something personal and
organic, like his clothes and his home, his skill, intel-
ligence, and health, or even his wife and children. Such
capital is not accumulated for the sake of an independent
revenue, but it grows up about him as the essential
means, or the natural accompaniment, or the mere op-
portunity, of earning his living by his own labor. It
has, therefore, no value of its own -its value, like the
value of health, skill, or intelligence, is realized*only as
higher wages or larger product of labor. To him the
act of adding permanent wealth to his possessions is not
38 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
the negative restraint of saving, but the positive act of
production. He builds his fences just as he raises his
chickens to feed his family, not knowing the refinements
of political economy which reveal to him that in the one
case he is saving wealth and in the other he is consuming
wealth. His production of "capital goods" is only the
same bodily and mental exertion as his production of
"consumption goods." It does not occur to him that in
building his fence he is suffering the pain of abstinence
from consumption of what that fence-building labor
might have produced. He had to do it anyhow, in order
to raise his crops and earn his living. And when he
finds afterwards from the census statistics, as the green-
backers did, that his fences and the like have added three
per cent a year to the wealth of the country, there is in
this to him no subtle virtue of saving, but hard work and
extra hours. Then, when the wide extension of the
market through the railroad placed his income at the
mercy of middlemen and his capital at the mercy of
bankers, he could see only the power of non-producing
capital over labor and producing capital.
Both anarchism and greenbackism were based on this
theory of the small working proprietor. Anarchism
would allow to him exclusive "possession" of his fixed
capital (including land) and greenbackism would al-
low exclusive ownership, but each would despoil fixed
capital of its value. Their methods of doing this were
different, because they differed in their attitude toward
government. This required a difference in their mech-
anism of credit. The anarchist, rejecting government,
rejected the enforcement of contracts by law and the
fulfillment of contracts by legal tender. He would pro-
vide a people's bank, at which each producer would
agree to accept the bills of exchange issued by every
nine] INTRODUCTION 39
other producer. Thus, by voluntary acceptance, the
producers would mutually finance each other's com-
mercial credit. In this way anarchism would accom-
plish its further end of limiting the possession of fixed
capital to the quantity which the holder himself could
use. The Bakuninists and Fenians might do this by re-
sorting to violence or the boycott, under the euphemism
of "public opinion;" but the peaceful anarchists would
do it by refusing credit on mortgages, and providing
credit only on bills of exchange representing products.
Holders of fixed capital could therefore get no credit
on capital not used, and consequently the increased com-
petition of users not paying interest or rent would drive
the prices of products down to their labor-cost. But
greenbackism, relying on government and legal tender,
would finance, not the products of the laborer in the
process of exchange, but his fixed capital in the process
of production. Instead of transitory bills of credit, cre-
ated for each consignment when it begins and canceled
when it ends, it would have a permanent currency, and a
mortgage security continuing while the capital itself
continued. And consequently, while anarchism would
take the earning power out of capital by driving the
prices of products down to their labor-cost, greenback-
ism would take it out by furnishing capital to all pro-
ducers at the labor-cost of operating the credit mechan-
ism.
This curious doctrine, its fallacy of savings augment-
ed by its fallacy of money, had been offered by Kellogg
in a form even more fallacious than that of the Labor
Congress. Kellogg would have the government lend its
legal-tender notes directly to borrowers on real-estate
security, allowing the holders to redeem the notes in gov-
ernment bonds. No limit was therefore placed on the
40 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
amount of issues, either of bonds or notes, except the
fancied limit self-imposed by borrowers at the point
where their investments of the borrowed money would
not yield a profit above the legal rate of interest, and this
legal rate, as figured by Kellogg at the labor cost of con-
ducting the credit mechanism, was only one per cent.
But Kellogg's orgy of hypothecation was sobered some-
what by the National Labor Congress, by limiting the
issues to the amount of bonds then outstanding, and by
placing the interest at three per cent, according to their
revised census of the annual accretions of weath.
Without stopping to analyze further the fallacies of
greenbackism, its significance lies in the fact that it cap-
tured the principal leaders of the wage-earners in 1867.
They had, indeed, prepared the way for it in the session
of the National Labor Union of 1866, when they
espoused cooperation as the only solution, on the same
ground, namely, that "a false, vicious financial system
endows capital with powers of increase largely in excess
of the development of national wealth by natural pro-
ductions." But, in the following year, 1867, they con-
cluded that no system of combination or cooperation
could secure to labor its natural rights as long as the
credit system enabled non-producers to accumulate
wealth faster than labor was able to add to the national
wealth. Cooperation would follow "as a natural con-
sequence," if producers could secure credit directly from
government.
This naive idea of cooperation and the part played by
credit could be entertained only by working men who
had not as yet passed over to the wage-consciousness of
Ira Steward, Karl Marx, and trade-unionism. To such
working men the capital needed for cooperation was not
entitled to interest or profit, anv more than the personal
nine] INTRODUCTION 41
capital used by them in their daily work. Cooperation
to them was simply a method of helping one another to
get access to opportunities or instruments by which the
income from labor would be enhanced. Or, if they
were not moved by the vision of cooperation, they were
moved by the similar vision of becoming small pro-
prietors, master-mechanics or farmers. It is not sur-
prising, therefore, that throughout their discussions
"free land and free money" were linked together. To
them it was the control of government by middlemen
and speculators that deprived the true producers equally
of the public lands and the small capital, both of which
were productive when labor secured the whole product,
and unproductive when used to deprive labor of its
product.
But there was another side of the greenback that
affected them more directly as wage-earners. This was
falling prices, business depression, and unemployment.
Not only was the paper currency, at the close of the
war, called upon to take the place of the confederate
paper in the south, but the Secretary of the Treasury
began at once to retire the currency and to contract the
volume available. The ensuing drop in prices, the panic
and depression, drove the Federal Congress that as-
sembled in December, 1867, to repeal what Congress
had authorized in 1866, and to forbid further contrac-
tion. It was in the midst of this depression and unem-
ployment that the Labor Congress made its leap from
cooperation to greenbackism. And, while the Congress
of the United States did not accept the Labor Congress
fallacy of money as a loan of capital, it acted upon the
theory of money as a measure of value of commodities,
and the ensuing period, from 1868 to 1873, of rising
prices, increasing employment and active trade union-
42 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
ism, witnessed the dissolution and fiasco of the Labor
Congress. 10 When, again, after 1873, panic and depres-
sion renewed the conditions that followed after 1866,
the Labor Congress was revived in the Greenback Labor
Party and the second stage of greenbackism as a scheme
to regulate prices took the place of its first stage as a
scheme to regulate the rate of interest.
In 1870 the National Labor Union determined final-
ly to organize an independent political party. The pro-
test of the trade unions was recognized to the extent that
two organizations - a political and an "industrial" - were
formed. The political organization nominated in 1872
the first candidate of an American Labor Party for
president of the United States, only to find that it had
been made the tool of politicians in their struggle to
control the ensuing nominations of the great parties.
The industrial organization, deserted by the trade
unions, held nominally a congress, but really a funeral,
the same year. The dissolution of the National Labor
Union, occurring actually in 1870, was followed by ten
years of conflicting and fruitless attempts toward na-
tional organization. The socialists, now furnished with
a battle-cry by Karl Marx, set out to enlist the unions
in the international revolt. Secret organizations with
many kinds of objects began their hidden propaganda.
The trade unions endeavored again to bring together
their forces as they had done in 1866.
But the time was not yet ripe. Industrial depression
was running its course. Trade-union effort required
the amalgamation or federation of pre-existing unions.
But these unions were non-existent. Consequently the
National Industrial Congress of 1873, 1874, and 1875,
although assembled at the call of the unions, admitted
10 See: Hinton, R. T. "Organization of Labor: its aggressive Phases," in the
Atlantic Monthly, May, 1871, p. 556, ff.
nine] INTRODUCTION 43
other organizations, renewed the allegiance to green-
backism, drafted and redrafted constitutions for bank-
rupt unions, and left only its heritage of a declaration of
principles to be appropriated later by the Knights of
Labor.*
INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS
Notwithstanding the peculiar conditions of civil war
and paper currency, the Labor Movement in America
was part of a general movement springing from western
civilization. This is suggested in the fact that the rise
and fall of the International Workingmen's Associa-
tion in Europe was contemporary with that of the Na-
tional Labor Union. Following are the dates and places
of the Congresses that grew out of the two movements :
CONGRESSES OF THE NATIONAL LABOR UNION AND THE INTERNA-
TIONAL WORKINGMEN'S ASSOCIATION
YEAR N. L. U. I. W. A.
1864 Louisville (forerunner) London (preliminary)
1865
1866 Baltimore Geneva
1867 Chicago Lausanne
1868 New York Brussels
1869 Philadelphia Basle
1870 Cincinnati (Franco-Prussian War)
1871 St. Louis London (conference)
1872 Columbus (political) The Hague (socialist)
Cleveland (industrial) St. Imier (anarchist)
1873 Geneva (socialist)
Geneva (anarchist)
Not only were the dates contemporaneous -the de-
velopment of issues and policies was similar and contem-
poraneous. The "International" is generally reputed
to have been organized in London in 1 864 by Karl Marx
*An account of the Industrial Congress will be found in Powderly's
Thirty Years of Labor, 106-130.
44 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
for the propaganda of international socialism. As a
matter of fact, its object was the practical effort of Brit-
ish trade union leaders to organize the working men of
the continent and to prevent the importation of conti-
nental strike-breakers. 11 The fact that Karl Marx wrote
its "inaugural address" was incident to the circumstance
that what he wrote was acceptable to the British union-
ists as against the draft of an address representing the
views of Mazzini submitted to them at the same time.
Marx emphasized the class-solidarity of labor against
Mazzini's harmony of capital and labor, but he did this
by reciting what British labor had done, without the help
of capitalists, through the Rochdale system of coopera-
tion; and what the British parliament had done, against
the protests of capitalists, in enacting the ten-hour law of
1847. Now that British trade unionists were demand-
ing the suffrage and laws to protect their unions, it fol-
lowed that Marx merely stated their demands when he
affirmed the independent, political organization of labor
in all lands. His inaugural address was a trade-union
document, not a Communist Manifesto. Not until
Bakunin and his following of anarchists had nearly
captured the organization did the program of socialism
become the leading issue. Then, in order to save it from
the anarchists, Marx and the British unionists succeeded
at the last Congress of the International in 1872 in hav-
ing its headquarters transferred from London to New
York.
11 See: Jaeckh, Gustav. Die Internationale (Leipzig, 1904) ; Beesly, Ed-
ward S. "The International Workingmen's Association," Fort. Rev., Nov., 1870;
Spargo, John. Karl Marx: His Life and Work (New York, 1910). Karl
Marx, in his letter to F. Bolte, says: "Die Internationale wurde gestiftet, um
die wirkliche Organisation der Arbeiterklass'e fur den Kampf an die Stelle der
sozialistischen oder halb sozialistischen Sekten zu setzen. Die urspriinglichen
Statuten wie die Inauguraladresse zeigen dies auf den ersten Blick." See
Brief 'e und Auszuge aus Briefen von Joh. Phil. Becker, Jos. Dietzgen, Friedrich
Engels, Karl Marx u. A. an F. A. Sorge und andere (Stuttgart, 1906).
nine] INTRODUCTION 45
The issue of anarchism and socialism came forward
in the International in 1867, the same year in which
the National Labor Union shifted from trade unionism
and cooperation to greenbackism ; and the issue did not
become acute until the congress at Basle, in 1869. Prior
to the latter year the International was busy with its
trade-union objects of supporting strikes in the indus-
trial centers of Europe and preventing the shipment of
strike breakers. Without forcing the parallel too min-
utely, the general parallel may be affirmed, that the
early years of the sixties in Europe and America rep-
resented the first organized resistance of wage-earners
against the conditions brought about by steam transpor-
tation and the telegraph; that, as long as this resistance
was successful they did not turn to general reforms, to
panaceas, or to politics; that when the better organiza-
tion of employers and the depression of business had
weakened their trade-union efforts, they sought refuge
in speculative philosophies and ultimate reforms ; that
the common object of these philosophies and reforms
was the control of capital by cooperative labor, leading
in Europe to socialism and anarchism, in America to
greenbackism; and that with the remoteness of these
remedies and their distant promises to immediate neces-
sities, with the appearance of "intellectuals" and the
disappearance of mechanics, the movement which be-
gan in both hemispheres as a struggle of wage-earners
to meet conditions ended as a combat of dogmatists or
politicians to solve the social problem, or to capture the
labor vote.
That the object of the Americans, like that of the
Englishmen, in joining an international moverpent, was
the control of emigration for the protection of trade
unions against the new menace of steam transportation
and labor mobility, is apparent from the proceedings
46 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
of the National Labor Union and the letters of the
American delegate who attended the congress at Basle.
Herein were the voluntary beginnings of those restric-
tions on immigration, which, within twenty years after,
by the votes of labor had reversed the time-honored
principles of American legislation. 12
In 1871 the International formed its first section in
America, and in 1872 its headquarters were removed to
New York. By 1874 tne attempts to internationalize
the American movement were abandoned, and in that
year a nationalized International, the United Workers
of America, was attempted. This failed, but was re-
newed in 1878 as the International Labor Union, still
further Americanized by alliance of the Socialists with
the Eight-hour Leaguers. 18
THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
Henry George represents the second stage of agra-
rianism in the United States, just as George Henry Ev-
ans, another and earlier printer, stands for the first
stage. 1 * Both of them based their arguments on man's
natural right to the soil. But in Evans's time there were
millions of acres yet unappropriated, and the practical
application of the theory needed only that these acres
be withheld from speculators and donated to settlers.
This first stage of agrarianism reached its culmination
in the Homestead Law of 1862. But immediately fol-
lowing that law the same Congress began the donation
of lands by the millions of acres to the Pacific railway
promoters. It seemed that the hopes of homesteaders
12 See: Commons, J. R. Races and Immigrants (New York, 1908), 117.
13 The platform of the International Labor Union will be found in McNeill's
Labor Movement, 161-163. Members of the organization were Sorge, Steward,
McNeill, Gunton, and J. P. McDonnell.
14 See volume vii, Introduction, and volume viii, chap. 3.
nine] INTRODUCTION 47
were to be dashed by a return to the land speculation and
extensive holdings of earlier days. The first strong pub-
lic protest against this reaction took shape in the Na-
tional Labor Congress of 1866, and the now elderly
land-reformers of the forties again gathered themselves
together to protect their dearly-acquired right of in-
dividual homestead. Their activity appears throughout
the proceedings of the National Labor Union and the
Industrial Congress; and the final success of their agita-
tion, in halting the gifts of land to corporations, marks
the termination of the homestead stage of agrarianism.
But in California the homestead law did not apply,
for enormous holdings had come down from the Spanish
and Mexican regimes. With the land completely oc-
cupied, the agrarian theory must take a new form, and
this was given by Henry George. Instead of distribu-
tion of unoccupied lands, he developed his idea of pub-
lic ownership of the unearned value of occupied lands.
This second stage of agrarian doctrine, growing out of
Californian conditions, was too advanced to fit other
American conditions, for not all of the homestead lands
of the middle west had, in 1879, been taken up. For this
reason the doctrine of Henry George, though originat-
ing in America, has found adoption in other parts of the
world, where, as in Australasia, land monopoly is sim-
ilar to that of California; or where, as in Germany and
England, a feudal landlordism has been able hitherto
to shift the ever-increasing burden of militarism upon
labor and industry. Finally, today, when the agricul-
tural lands have been distributed, their fertility extract-
ed, and only the mountains, forests, waters, and deserts
remain to be exploited by dummy homesteaders, the
individualistic natural rights of the early agrarian move-
48 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
merits give way to the common rights of a third move-
ment -the Conservation of Natural Resources.
PATRONS OF HUSBANDRY AND KNIGHTS OF LABOR
Prior to the sixties the main object of farmers' organ-
izations was the technical improvement of agriculture.
These organizations found their seat in the settled com-
munities of the east and their activity in county fairs,
competitive tests of new machinery, and selection and
distribution of stock and seeds. In so far as organiza-
tions with economic and political objects were con-
cerned, they were merged with the Farmers', Mechan-
ics', and Working Men's Parties of the thirties, or with
the two leading political parties. But after the fifties
the farmers of the west, dispersed by the railroad, de-
pendent on the middleman, and deficient in capital,
land values, and credit, began to agree that good prices
were needed as much as good crops. Their first public
expression was probably that of the Illinois "Farmers'
Platform" of 1858, with its voice against "nonpro-
ducers," its admonition of "ready pay," its glimpse of
cooperative purchasing and selling, its demand on gov-
ernment for "seeds, plants, and facts." But the Civil
War and its rise of prices postponed for ten years the
response to this call. It was another fall in prices, ex-
ceeding that of 1858, that awoke the farmers of 1868.
The Federal Congress, in the latter year, by the over-
whelming vote of the farmers' representatives, stopped
the retirement of the government paper money. But
there had arisen another government over which the
farmer had no control -the railroad corporation. He
might check the fall in prices caused by his political
government- he could not compel a similar fall in the
prices controlled by this industrial government. In the
nine] INTRODUCTION 49
one case he merely notified his representatives in Con-
gress, in the other he organized; and "the Grangers"
then began that radical but tedious revolution of Ameri-
can ideas which is slowly bringing industry under the
political power of democracy.
But it was not the organization popularly known as
the "Grangers" that produced the Granger legislation.
The Patrons of Husbandry was merely that one of sev-
eral organizations through which the farmers were best
able to discover their common interests and to inspire
one another in a common cause. It is significant that in
the two great divisions of American labor, those of the
farmer and the wage-earner, the closing years of the
sixties brought forth independently two peculiar but
similar organizations that became the rallying-points of
the first effective movements of each. The Patrons of
Husbandry, organized in 1868 by O. H. Kelley, the gov-
ernment clerk, was strangely like the Knights of Labor,
organized in 1869 by Uriah S. Stephens, the clothing-
cutter. Each was a secret organization ; each possessed
an impressive ritual and a centralized authority; and
each was diverted from its original purpose, against the
protests of its founders, by the necessities of its recruits.
The object of each was "educational" and "moral :"
to instruct the farmer in the principles of agriculture;
to inspire in him a high regard for his noble occupation,
the basis of national happiness; to raise the wage-earner
above the narrow view of his class, or trade, or job ; to
show him to himself as an aid in the world's redemption ;
to lead him to equip himself by discipline, thought, and
study. The ritual of each was designed by its solemn
fascination to awaken these ideas and establish this lofty
purpose. "Every tool used in agriculture" had "Its ap-
5 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
propriate lecture;" and the young wage-earner, mys-
teriously conducted and admonished at the several
stages of his initiation, was moved by a new sense of
brotherhood and power. Secrecy added, not the suspi-
cions of conspiracy or the shield of revolution, but con-
fidence, freedom of expression, and intimacy. There
were other secret organizations, especially among wage-
earners, during the distressful and helpless years that
followed the panic of 1873. Some of them, like the
Molly Maguires, were the criminal remnants of sup-
pressed trade unions. 15 But it was this union of secrecy,
symbolism, and big brotherhood that drew the wage-
earners in unexpected numbers after 1877 into the
Knights of Labor. The similar attraction had over-
whelmed the Patrons in 1872 and 1873, and in both or-
ganizations forthwith the novitiates pressed for imme-
diate tangible results. It was not the education or
moral uplift offered by both, nor insurance benefits of-
fered by neither, nor schemes of cooperation vainly in-
augurated by the leaders, but prices of products and
wages of labor that both were forced to demand for their
new adherents. The cloak of secrecy was loosened, the
rank and file took possession, and these moralizing or-
ganizations became the unwilling instruments of the
modern aggressive movements of legislation, strikes,
and boycotts.
The outcome of each was analogous. Thousands
of headlong recruits brought with them politicians,
self-seekers, and camp-followers. Cooperation failed,
strikes and boycotts were overdone. The disappointed
15 See especially Allan Pinkerton's Strikers, Communists, Tramps and De-
tectives (1878), 88, 89; James F. Rhodes, "The Molly Maguires in the Anthra-
cite Region of Pennsylvania," Am. Hist. Rev., vol. xv, no. 3, 547-561.
nine] INTRODUCTION 51
masses deserted as precipitately as they had enlisted.
The Patrons saved their organization by returning to
their original purpose and leaving aggressive measures
to the Greenback Labor Party, the Farmers' Unions, or
the Farmers' Alliance; the Knights remained a bush-
whacking annoyance on the heels of its successor, the
American Federation of Labor.
JOHN R. COMMONS.
JOHN B. ANDREWS.
I
LABOR CONDITIONS
i. AMERICAN MECHANICS AND
IMMIGRANTS
[Burn, James Dawson] Three Years Among the Working Classes in
the United States During the War (London, 1865). On the subject
of this chapter, see E. D. Kite's Social and Industrial Conditions in the
North During the Civil War (New York, 1910).
[Pages 71-72] ... It is not a little amusing to
strangers to see how readily men adapt themselves to the
circumstances of the time being, as they are neither re-
strained by delicacy of feeling nor the dread of failure
from undertaking any sort of business, however ignorant
they may be of its proper management. In my own trade
I have known men who have boxed the compass of al-
most every species of human industry. Some have per-
ambulated the length and breadth of the States, gone
overland to California, and when tired of the gold re-
gion, returned by the same route. A working man in
this country is situated very differently from one of his
own class at home ; if he have the means, he can go where
he pleases without the trouble of carrying a certificate
of character in his pocket. Indeed it would be just as
admissible in the social code for a man seeking work to
demand a character of the "Boss" he may apply to, as
that he should be asked for one. In these matters Jack
is as good as his master. The relationship which exists
between slaves and their owners in this land of liberty
has been the means of kicking the word master from the
Yankee vocabulary, and the quaint phrase of "Boss" has
been substituted in its place.
This country has had the rare advantage of growing
56 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
into national greatness without having had to pass
through the ordeal of feudalism, or being trammelled in
her progress by the tyrannical influence arising from
the pride of caste; but though she has escaped the de-
grading effects of the one, the other is a contingency she
may look forward to as one of the necessary develop-
ments of her social system, and that, too, at no distant
period. I have no fault to find with working people for
acting with manly independence in their intercourse
with their employers. The two classes of men are re-
lated to each other by the conditions of mutual interest;
but in this country, rudeness and want of civility on the
part of the working man is often mistaken for straight-
forwardness of character, and as a consequence, ignorant
and presumptuous people are frequently guilty of the
most ridiculous conduct. . .
[Pages 182-190] For the benefit of those of my
countrymen who are engaged in the hat manufacturing
business I will endeavour to lay before them such in-
formation as may be of interest, but more particularly
to those among them who may think of emigrating.
[Description of processes omitted here.] I may mention
that there are few men whose hands can stand blocking
brush hats for any great length of time. The most of this
work is done by Germans, Frenchmen, and Italians ; and
those accustomed to it can make from fourteen to twenty
dollars a week, according to their readiness at the busi-
ness. Since the price of hatters' materials has undergone
such a great advance in consequence of the war tariff siz-
ing hats has become a very variable process. Much of the
refuse of hat-shops, which heretofore was looked upon
as useless rubbish, is now mixed up with new stock and
made into hats. The quantity of this worn-out material
used in some lots of bodies is so disproportioned to the
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 57
new stock, that the men have often much difficulty in
making their work sound. Generally speaking where
the stock is not overlaid, the men can make very fair
wages, but a stranger would scarcely credit the very
great difference there is both between the character of
the work and the prices paid for it in shops, not only in
the same district, but within a few doors of each other.
Mr. Joseph Gillham, in whose shop I worked, pays on
a higher scale than any man in the trade within my
knowledge; his goods, however, as a general rule, are of
better quality than those made by other houses, and as
his bodies are laid a large size they require much dili-
gence and well-applied labour before they are fit to pass
through the hands of the foreman.
When business is in anything like a healthy condition,
an ordinary good sizer can make from twelve to fifteen
dollars a week. It may be noted that the British work-
men who learned their trade when they had to form
their own bodies, as a general rule, make a very poor
figure in competing with men who have obtained a
knowledge of their business in the states. Many of these
men will size two hats for one with some of the best
English workmen. The old system of operating upon a
single hat at the plank has been superseded by the Amer-
ican workmen, who size three, and occasionally four
bodies together in a cloth. The whole secret in getting
through the work quickly lies in keeping a loose roll
until the bodies are nearly into the required size. While
some men, who were ordinary fair sizers, laboured over
a dozen of bodies in a day, I have seen others, without
any apparent effort, do from two to three dozen. I have
frequently had occasion to observe a good deal of dis-
parity between workmen at home, but never anything
like that which I have witnessed in America.
58 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
It will scarcely be credited by the old journeymen in
England that some of the fire-eaters among the Yankee
hatters have been known to make as much as fifty dol-
lars in one week at certain kinds of work. I know sev-
eral men within my own sphere of observation who,
when in full employment, made from twenty to thirty-
five dollars a week. These people, however, belong to
the class who labour like horses with the lash contin-
ually held over them, and many of them drink like sav-
ages. So far as my own experience is in question, I have
rarely ever known one of these extremely fast workmen
who could make it convenient to save a cent. As they
made their money, they spent it, and in a manner which
showed that they were thoroughly regardless of the con-
tingencies of health or continued employment.
If the hat business could be relied upon as a steady
source of industry, I daresay it would be one of the best
trades in the country. I am sorry to say, however, that
there is no manufacturing business of which I have a
knowledge so decidedly spasmodic in its character. This
is accounted for by the amazing power of production
which the "Forming Machine" gives the manufactur-
ers. An order for a thousand dozen of hats in a district
only lasts a short time. In the phraseology of the trade,
the "squirtes" quickly gobble up the work. These fast
men have such ravenous appetites for labour that they
can scarcely spare time to eat their victuals, for fear they
should not get their full share. In most of the shops the
men get the work out of hand as quickly as they can do
it, and the fast men have all the chances of monopolizing
more than an equal share of the hats, which is certainly
not using the slower class of workmen fairly. In the old
country, I have never witnessed anything so disgustingly
disagreeable as this selfishness of the American hat-
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 59
makers. No doubt it arises in part from the unsteady
nature of the business, and from their wants being in-
creased by their highly artificial state of existence.
When the business is in a prosperous condition, there
is a constant struggle between the men and their employ-
ers about prices. I have seen as many as four shop-
calls (meetings) in the course of a day upon as many
different kinds of work. It may be mentioned that each
shop regulates its own prices. It is a rule with the em-
ployers, in giving out a new lot of hats, to leave a margin
of from four to ten cents, according to the nature of the
stock and weight upon each hat; if the work is accepted
by the men at the price on the tickets, nothing is said;
but if the work should prove to be underpaid, the shop
is called, and a higher rate demanded. In consequence
of this state of things, the men and -their employers are
continually watching each other.
I have observed that the turns-out which have oc-
curred in the trade in the localities in which I have been
situated have been caused by a set of headstrong young
men, who acted from the mere impulse of feeling ; and by
far the worst feature in these matters is that men of
prudence and experience dare not open their mouths or
use their influence at the public meetings, for fear of be-
ing black-balled. As a general thing, the men have lit-
tle regard for the feelings or interests of each other, and
respect of persons is a matter quite out of the question.
Should any man with a proper sense of right and wrong
attempt to defend an employer in a disputed case, he
would be sure to be branded as a traitor, as well as being
made a butt of ridicule by every fool in the shop who
chose to raise a laugh at his expense, or to gratify his own
evil disposition.
I have no hesitation in saying that the most vulgar, the
60 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
most ignorant, self-conceited, and headstrong class of
men either in my own trade, or any other, are to be found
among those who belong to one or other of the three
divisions of the United Kingdom. This probably arises
from an endeavour on the part of the new comers to
imitate the worst features in the character of the natives,
and in attempting this they out-Herod Herod in Yankee
swagger and arrogance. The men in America, like the
same class in Great Britain, who are the most loud-
mouthed bawlers for trade rights and manly independ-
ence, are, with few exceptions, the meanest Jerry Sneaks
and subservient tools in the trade when they come to be
tested by even a small pressure of want. In seasons of
dull trade the employers have matters all their own way,
and of course are not slow to ring the changes upon the
men. On these occasions the "all or none" gentlemen
have no alternative but to accept a half loaf as being bet-
ter than no bread.
Before the commencement of the war, a man in the
trade, with economy and ordinary prudence, if employed
even two-thirds of his time, might have saved money, as
he could have supported a moderate family with six dol-
lars a week. That time in the United States, like a
dream of the past, is gone, and I fear never to return.
From the open nature of both the hat trade and many
other branches of skilled industry in America, a few
years will thoroughly overstock them with hands, the
immediate consequence of which will be a correspond-
ing depreciation in the value of labour. In the mean-
time, from the loose system of apprenticeship which pre-
vails, journeymen are being turned out as if by steam.
I think the time is not far distant on this continent when
the exclusive system of the European guilds will be in-
troduced into the various branches of skilled indus-
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 61
try. . . As long as trades offer inducements to young
men to join them, few will be content to spend their lives
in the drudgery of the fields, or in what is looked upon
as the meaner occupations of civilized life. The work-
ing-classes in America will be more impatient under a
severe commercial pressure than any other people, when
their Government ceases to spend a thousand millions of
dollars annually, as they are doing while I am writing.
They will find that four years of feverish prosperity
have swelled their ranks and narrowed the field of their
labour at the same time. This will not only be the case ;
but when the whole trade of the nation is made to col-
lapse like an empty bladder, and the overstocked labour-
market supplemented by return volunteers who have
escaped death in the field or by disease, the struggle to
live in many cases will be one of life and death.
One of the worst features in the hat trade in America
for the journeyman, is the constant liability to be moved
about from one establishment to another. When an em-
ployer finds his business begin to slacken, he immedi-
ately discharges a number of his men. This uncertainty
prevails throughout the whole trade. It is therefore a
matter of indifference where a man removes to; he is
never safe from being shuttle-cocked from one place to
another. I have known twenty men shopped who were
all on the road again in less than a fortnight. No fault
can be found with the employers for thus sending the
journeymen about their business when it may suit either
their taste or convenience, inasmuch as the men are in the
habit of playing the same game when their end of the
beam is up.
If a journeyman hatter in any part of the United King-
dom can earn from twenty-five to thirty shillings a week,
I would certainly advise him to remain where he" is, nor
62 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
do I know any class of tradesmen under the altered cir-
cumstances of the country who are likely to better their
condition. As I have said before, the only people likely
to improve their social condition by removing to the
United States, are the strong, healthy, unskilled labour-
ers who now crowd the labour markets at home. How
long the country may even suit this class I cannot pre-
sume to say.
I think both the hours of meal-time and the distribu-
tion of the hours of labour in America are much better ar-
ranged than in any part of the United Kingdom. Work-
ingmen take their morning meal about six o'clock, com-
mence the labour of the day at seven, dine at twelve,
leave off work at six p.m., and have supper about seven.
I look upon the early breakfast as not only a useful for-
tification to the stomach against the baneful cold humid
air of winter mornings, but it is calculated in no small
degree to prevent that craving for intoxicating liquors
which is so common among certain classes of tradesmen
in Great Britain, but more especially in the northern
division of it. The early breakfast hour is not confined
to any class of people in America; all grades of men
seem determined to take time by the forelock, and though
the people glide through the world in the majesty of
leanness, it is by no means either for the want of food or
regularity in their meal hours.
When conversing with Mr. Peddie, the trunk manu-
facturer, concerning the comparative steadiness of his
own countrymen and his experience of the people in his
own employment, he had no hesitation in giving the
Americans the preference for general habits of temper-
ance. And as I have already remarked, my own experi-
ence forces me to arrive at the same conclusion. It is a
misfortune, however, that men can be drunk in America
without the use of intoxicating liquors!
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 63
[Pages 283-285] ... It would be impossible to
do anything like justice to the Institution of Emigrants
in New York in the short sketch I am writing, but it will
be useful to bring before the public a few of the leading
features of the establishment. Every man, woman and
child who comes to New York in the character of an
emigrant must pass through the office of the Commis-
sioners of Emigration in Castle Garden. Before the
passengers of an emigrant ship leave her, their luggage
is taken charge of by officers of the institution, for which
numbered metal tokens are given. Both the passengers
and luggage are then landed by the aid of a steam-tug
belonging to the commissioners. After this the passen-
gers pass through the landing-office in front of a series
of desks, where their names, age, profession, country,
the name of the vessel they arrived .in, their destination,
and the names of such friends or relations to whom they
are going (if they have any) are booked. They are then
forwarded to boarding-houses which are licensed by the
municipal authorities, and under the direct patronage
of the commissioners. The custom of these houses is
made to depend upon the manner in which their keepers
conduct their business; they are not only required to
treat the emigrants fairly in their charges, but they are
held accountable for such property as may be entrusted
to them by the lodgers. The luggage left in the Garden
can be called for when it suits the convenience of the
owners, and whether removed soon or late there is no
charge made. If an emigrant intends to remain in New
York, and his luggage is such as he cannot carry away,
it will be forwarded to his address at a much lower rate
than he could have it done by engaging a conveyance
himself.
Those emigrants who are going to the interior of the
country are forwarded by the commissioners in their
64 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
own steamers either to the railway stations, or the vessels
by which they are to travel, and in order to prevent their
being imposed upon, they are supplied with tickets
which will free them to their destination, in whatever
part of the States that may be. When the emigrants
leave New York for a distant part of the country, the
commissioners do not lose sight of them, but by means of
their agents in many of the distant towns, provide asy-
lums for the indigent, and employment for the able-
bodied. The class of emigrants who are without the
means of transporting themselves to the interior of the
country have loans granted upon such luggage as they
may possess, which they can redeem when in employ-
ment, and no interest is charged for the money. The
commissioners are also agents for employers over the
whole of the States, so that they are enabled to find situ-
ations for emigrants in almost any of the branches of
industry. Their employment office at the landing build-
ing is a highly valuable institution. By means of this
office, numbers of young girls are saved from moral ship-
wreck. . .
[Page 289] About five years ago the Commissioners
of Emigration made an attempt to learn the amount of
money brought into the country by each emigrant ; but as
many of the emigrants refused to give the information,
they were obliged to give up the task as a hopeless one.
So far as they had proceeded, they were enabled to come
to the conclusion that, upon an average, each emigrant
brought twenty pounds British money into the coun-
try. . .
[Page 291-292] It would be well if all the poor
emigrants who make their way to this country could
avail themselves of the comforts, speed, and convenience
which steam-vessels offer over sailing ships. The man
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 65
who has once travellel between Europe and America
in the fetid hold of an emigrant-ship, has learned a les-
son which his memory is likely to retain. I have yet be-
fore my mind's eye the dead calm, with its consequent
lazy indifference and anxieties, the evenings with their
immoralities, low intrigues, and strange demonstrations
of natural temper, and the storm with its prayers and
reckless profanity, in which the fair-weather bully be-
comes blanched with fear, while the seemingly timid as-
sume a quiet magnanimity of character. How certain
classes among the passengers pilfer from their neigh-
bours, how the good-natured and the simple are imposed
upon, and how the weak and the retiring are sent to the
wall. Yes, and I remember, too, how some of the wily
sailors fawned about the well-to-do passengers, in order
to draw from their stores of creature comforts, and how
rudely they treated the poor devils who had to live upon
the ship's fare; and how the ebony cook attended to the
passengers who had tipped him with the magic blarney
of the Queen's coin; and how the penniless had to hang
on for their meals in hungry anxiety to the last, with kicks
and curses for their consolation. How a feeble-minded
creature, in the character of a medical man, crept down
below once a day, and how quickly he retraced his
steps to the free air above. Then the colony of squall-
ing children, with scolding unreasoning mothers, flirt-
ing gawky girls, who mistook vulgar flattery for kindly
attention; dirty old hags, who amused themselves alter-
nately with fault-finding, and hunting game over their
vile bodies; and squads of young men who were learn-
ing their first lessons in life in a school where the com-
mon decencies of civilized society were set aside. In
these ocean journeys the virtuous and well-disposed pas-
sengers have much to suffer, but, generally speaking,
66 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
they pass through the ordeal with greater faith in them-
selves, and they learn that men are more indebted to the
society in which they are brought up for the formation of
their character, than to any will of their own. . .
[Pages 301, 302] Three classes of people are most
likely to better their condition by removing to the United
States. In the first place, I would name unskilled la-
bourers who have been accustomed to a low standard of
wages, poor food, and miserable dwellings. The second
class consists of those whose social and political rights
and liberties are in the keeping of their lords and mas-
ters, as in several of the German States. The third class
is made up of men from the various grades of society in
the Old World who have managed their business of ap-
propriation in such a bungling manner as to make them
forfeit the good opinion of their neighbours, and cause
the administrators of the law to be solicitous for their
personal safety! All these will find a ready market for
labour and enterprise in the United States, and with
health, strength, and a willing mind, it is a man's own
fault if he does not make himself a useful member of
society, and secure many of the comforts and conven-
iences of civilized life to which he was a stranger at
home. One condition, perhaps, ought to be named as
essential to the success of working-men; they should
bring with them youth and good health, so that they may
be enabled to battle with the seasons until they become
acclimatized.
2. THE COST OF LIVING"
The Printer (New Yrk), July, 1864, p. xoa.
THE NECESSITIES OF THE TIMES. We have "gone
through the mill," and "know whereof we speak," and
are satisfied that no family embracing four children can
exist in comfort on less than the following:
EXPENDITURE FOR THE WEEK
One bag of flour . . . $1.40
Small measure of potatoes, daily, at 13 cents
per day (7 days) .... .91
One quarter of a pound of tea . . .32
One pound of coffee (mixed or adulterated -
can't afford better) .35
Three and a half pounds of sugar . . .80
Meats for the week .... 3.00
Two bushels of coal . . . .1.20
Four pounds of butter . . .1.60
Two pounds of lard .... .38
Kerosene ..... .20
Soap, starch, pepper, salt, vinegar, etc. . .75
Vegetables ..... .50
Dried apples -to promote the health of chil-
dren .....
Sundries .....
Rent .....
Total $16.00*
16 Consult: Mitchell, W. C. Gold, prices, and wages under the greenback
standard (Berkeley, Cal., 1908) ; and A History of the greenbacks, with special
reference to the economic consequences of their issue, 1862-65 (Chicago, 1903).
*This makes an actual total of $16.10.
68 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Every old housekeeper is aware that, in addition to
the above, there are numberless calls for three cents here,
and five cents there, and that an additional dollar might
squarely be added to our estimate; but we will suppose
the printer's wife to be as firm as a rock on the subject of
expenses, and that she will keep within the absolute ne-
cessities ; and even then, in the name of humanity, how
is she to get along? The average wages of all branches
of the Art in this city is sixteen dollars per week- the
average families, of the number stated; how, then, are
these families to subsist, if, with the utmost watchful-
ness, every dollar is consumed for food and house-rent?
Wearing apparel has trebled in price, and not one dol-
lar is left to procure a supply. Every workman's family
is short of house-linens, underclothing, shoes, etc. ; and
the fortunate printer that has more than one suit to his
back, or whose wife can boast of more than a change of
calicoes, can scarcely be found.
It may be objected that our estimate of weekly ex-
penses is too high -that the rent item can be reduced.
But let any family man carefully inspect the items, and
he will be satisfied they cannot be reduced, except on the
half-ration principle. As to rent, if the printer takes
his family into a crowded tenement house, he may pos-
sibly save a little -only to be doubly swallowed up in
doctor's bills, and the general health of his wife and
children materially affected.
But where is the remedy?
The remedy consists in [one] of two courses. Either
the workman must have his wages nominally increased,
or be paid on the gold standard of four years ago. The
average [value] of sixteen dollars now paid is really
only eight dollars; and what printer was expected to
support a family on that pittance four years ago? The
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 69
old-fashioned eleven dollars a week -specie standard -
enabled the workman to live. At the present value of
paper money, the minimum wages must be twenty-two
dollars to place the journeyman in the position he for-
merly occupied at eleven dollars per week. It matters
little which way it is done, so long as the receipts are
made equal to the expenditures; only let it be done, and
let the employers feel and acknowledge that the increase
is reasonable and called for by the peculiar circum-
stances of the times.
The Printer, Aug., 1864, p. 116.
In the article referred to, we gave a table of necessary
expenses for a family of six- the father, mother, and
four children. When that table was written, it was cor-
rect, but when it appeared in print it was far below the
market figure. We append it again, at present rates,
for the reason that, when a large increase is called for,
it is but fair that we give those gentlemen the reasons
for the call :
EXPENDITURE FOR THE WEEK
One bag of flour . . . $1.80
Small measure of potatoes, daily, at .17 cents
per day (7 days) .... 1.19
One quarter of a pound of tea . . .38
One pound of coffee (mixed or adulterated -
can't afford better) .35
Three and a half pounds of sugar . . 1.05
Milk ..... .56
Meats for the week (being a half ration sup-
piy) 3-50
Two bushels of coal . . . .1.36
Four pounds of butter . . . 1.60
Two pounds of lard . . . .38
Carried over $12. 17
7 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Brought over $12.17
Kerosene . . . . . .30
Soap, starch, pepper, salt, vinegar, etc. . i .00
Vegetables ..... .50
Dried apples -to promote the health of chil-
dren ..... .25
Sundries ..... .28
Rent ..... 4.00
Total . . . . $18.50
Fincher's Trades' Review, March 31, 1866, p. 8, col. i.
ADDRESS TO THE IRON WORKERS of Great Britain, by the
United Sons of Vulcan (known as the Puddlers' and
Boilers' Union) of the United States, March i,
1866. . .
We shall now proceed to give you a correct list of
prices of the necessaries of life in this country at the
present time. This will not be a list of what you can
buy for in New York at wholesale prices, but retail
prices as they actually are here, and copied verbatim
from my (Tommy) store book, only that I shall follow
the plan of the Reporter, and give the prices in English
money, the better for your understanding thereof.
It is an old saying that straws show which way the cur-
rent runs ; we shall therefore commence with the straws.
A box of matches costs two pence; a box of blacking five
pence; a spool of sewing thread, 300 yards, six pence;
a broom to sweep the house with three shillings; butter
two shillings and six pence per pound ; common brown
sugar eight pence per pound; raisins, common twenty
pence per pound ; eggs per dozen twenty pence ; common
black tea six shillings per pound; coffee unroasted and
unground twenty pence per pound ; candles eleven pence
per pound; ham fourteen pence per pound; potatoes six
shillings per bushel ; rice eight pence per pound ; flour
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 71
per barrel of 196 pounds forty-seven shillings and six
pence; a pair of hob-nail shoes to work in the mill with,
twenty-two shillings and six pence; a flannel shirt for
mill work ten shillings ; a suit of men's Sunday clothes,
that in England will cost four pound sterling, in Ameri-
ca will cost sixteen pounds; women's wearing apparel in
proportion to the above prices. Coal here, in the centre
of the coal region of America, will cost you one shilling
per hundredweight and buy it by the load ; the rent of
two small rooms will cost thirty-two shillings per
month; boarding twenty-three shillings per week; your
washing will cost you five pence for each article. We
have a common saying now in this country, that you go
to market with the money in a basket, and carry home
the goods in your pocket. . .
3. THE SEWING WOMEN
Fincher's Trades' Review, March 18, 1865, p. 2, col. 6.
Complaint8 similar to the following were made in New York and other
cities.
The sewing women of Cincinnati have addressed the
following memorial to President Lincoln :
Cincinnati, O., Feb. 20, 1865.
To His EXCELLENCY, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President
of the United States : The undersigned, wives, widows,
sisters, and friends of the soldiers in the army of the
United States, depending upon our own labor for bread,
sympathizing with the Government of the United
States, and loyal to it, beg leave to call the attention of
the Government, through his Excellency the President,
to the following statement of facts :
1. We are willing and anxious to do the work re-
quired by the Government for clothing and equipping
the armies of the United States, at the prices paid by
the Government.
2. We are unable to sustain life for the price offered
by contractors, who fatten on their contracts by grind-
ing immense profits out of the labor of their operatives.
As an example, the contractors are paid one dollar and
seventy-five cents per dozen for making gray woolen
shirts, and they require us to make them for one dollar
per dozen. This is a sample of the justice meted out to
us, the willing laborers, without whom the armies could
not be promptly clothed and equipped.
We most respectfully request that the Government,
through the proper officers of the Quartermaster's De-
partment, issue the work required directly to us, we
LABOR CONDITIONS 73
giving ample security for the prompt and faithful ex-
ecution of the work and return of the same at the time
required, and in good order.
We are in no way actuated by a spirit of faction, but
desirous of aiding the best government on earth, and at
the same time securing justice to the humble laborer.
The manufacture of pants, blouses, coats, drawers,
tents, tarpaulins, etc., exhibits the same irregularity and
injustice to the operative. Under the system of direct
employment of the operative by the Government, we
had no difficulty, and the Government, we think, was
served equally well.
We hope that the Government, in whose justice we
have all confidence, will at once hear us and heed our
humble prayer, and we will ever pray, etc.
4. THE IMPORTATION OF LABOR
(a) THE AMERICAN EMIGRANT COMPANY
The legislature of Connecticut enacted a law, approved June 17, 1863
Private Acts, 1863, Chapter 32 chartering the American Emigrant Company,
"for the purpose of procuring and assisting emigrants from foreign countries to
settle in the United States, and especially in the Western States and Terri-
tories." Power was given the company to purchase and dispose of land. The
act was amended June 8, 1865, to give the company the right to own and
operate steamships to transport emigrants, to act as agents for sale of lands,
and to own and sell live stock. In May, 1871, another amendment changed the
name of the company to the American Emigrant and Trust Company. The
opportunity for the company was provided by the Federal "act to encourage
immigration," approved July 4, 1864. U.S. Session Laws, 38th congress, first
session, chap, ccxlvi. This provided for the validity of contracts made by
emigrants in foreign countries, pledging their wages for a term not to exceed
twelve months, to repay expenses of their emigration. This contract should
operate as a lien upon any land or other property acquired by the immigrant,
until the obligation was liquidated. This act of Congress was repealed by a
rider attached to a law enacted in March, 1868. - U.S. Session Laws, 4oth con-
gress, second session, chap, xxxviii, sec. 4.
(i) Organization.
Seventh Annual Report of the Chamber of Commerce of the State of
New York, 1864-5; "Special Reports," 21-22.
THE AMERICAN EMIGRANT COMPANY, chartered for
the purpose of procuring and assisting emigrants from
foreign countries to settle in the United States.
Authorized Capital . . . $1,000,000
Paid up Capital . . . 540,000
The object of this Company is to import laborers, es-
pecially skilled laborers, from Great Britain, Germany,
Belgium, France, Switzerland, Norway and Sweden,
for the manufacturers, rail-road companies, and other
employers of labor in America. To accomplish this,
it has established extensive agencies through those coun-
tries, and undertakes to hire men in their native homes
and safely to transfer them to their employers here. A
LABOR CONDITIONS 75
system so complete has been put in operation here that
miners, mechanics (including workers in iron and steel
of every class), weavers, and agricultural, rail-road and
other laborers, can now be procured without much de-
lay, in any numbers, and at a reasonable cost.
The Company comprises, among others, the follow-
ing gentlemen: A. G. Hammond, President of the Ex-
change Bank, Hartford, Connecticut; Hon. Francis
Gillette, late U.S. senator for Connecticut; F. Chamber-
lin, H. K. Welch, and John Hooker, Hartford; Henry
Stanley, of New-Britain, Conn.; A. W. North, S. P.
Lyman and John Williams, New- York; Daniel T.
Harris, president Conn. River Rail-road, Springfield,
Mass. ; E. B. Gillett, president of Hampden Bank, West-
field, Mass.; Charles Hulbert, late of J. M. Beebe and
Co., Boston; F. C. D. McKay and James C. Savery, of
Des Moines.
The Company is enabled, by special permission, to
refer to the following gentlemen: Hon. S. P. Chase,
chief justice of the Supreme Court of the United
States, Washington, D.C. ; Hon. Gideon Welles, sec-
retary of the Navy; Governor Buckingham, Connecti-
cut; Chief Justice Hinman, Connecticut; Henry A.
Perkins, president Hartford Bank; Thomas Belknap,
president State Bank, Hartford; Bank of New- York,
New- York; Theodore Tilton, editor, Independent,
New- York; Samuel Bolles, editor, and Dr. J. G. Hol-
land, Springfield Republican, Springfield, Mass.; Pro-
fessor Caswell, Providence, R.I. ; Russell and Erwin
Manufacturing Co., New- York; Hon. R. A. Chapman,
judge Supreme Court, Mass.; Rev. H. W. Beecher,
Brooklyn, N.Y.; Henry C. Carey, Esq., Philadelphia;
Hon. Samuel B. Ruggles, New- York; Hon. James Dix-
on, U.S. senator, Conn.; Hon. Geo. Ashmun, Mass.;
7 6 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Hon. Charles Sumner, U. S. senator, Mass. ; Hon. Henry
Wilson, U.S. senator, Mass.; Ex-gov. Sprague, U.S.
senator, Rhode Island; Hon. L. S. Foster, U.S. sen-
ator, Conn.; Morris Ketchum, Esq., New- York; Gov.
Stone, Iowa; Hon. Jas. Harlan, U.S. senator, Iowa;
Hon. Horace Everett, Council Bluffs, Iowa; J. S. Mor-
gan and Co. (late Geo. Peabody and Co.), London.
JOHN WILLIAMS, General Agent for Emigration.
No. 3 Bowling Green, New- York.
(2) Methods.
"Report of Mr. Thomas D. Shipman on The State of the Labor Market,
etc., in New York," from the Annual Report of the Minister of Agri-
culture of the Province of Canada for the year 1865. In Sessional
Papers for 1866, no. 5, 83-84.
. . . This association is called the "American
Emigrant Company;" its offices are situated at No. 3,
Bowling Green, New York, and the prospectus informs
us that it has been incorporated by the government with
the object of assisting and procuring emigrants from
foreign countries to settle in the United States. The
company represents a capital of $1,000,000, nearly two-
thirds of which are paid up, and it acts as the agent of
employers in the United States in making contracts with
mechanics abroad, stipulating that they shall be hired
for a specific term at a fixed rate of wages. The class
of emigrants in requisition .are stated to be mechanics of
all descriptions, agricultural, railroad and other labor-
ers, miners and factory operatives. This includes all
classes of skilled and unskilled labor.
The cost of the emigrant's passage, if he be engaged
through the agency of this company, is advanced to him,
if necessary, under certain conditions, and he makes a
contract which is valid in law, to repay the expenses
of his emigration in reasonable instalments, by pledging
the wages of his labor.
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 77
This system goes far to remove the poverty and inex-
perience of the workingman, for without any risk of his
own he is transported to the best field for the exercise
of his industry, and where he is most likely to reap suc-
cess.
He has thus a fixed purpose before leaving his home,
and is guaranteed protection till he reaches his employ-
er. He is promptly carried to the scene of his labor,
and loses neither time nor money in wandering about in
search of employment.
The American Emigrant Company, to use its own
words, will thus "be an efficient channel of intercourse
between the man in America who wants help and the
man in England who wants work."
This company, also, does not limit its sphere of action
to those with whom it makes special contracts, but it
offers all emigrants, that is, those who go on their own
resources, all the advantages of its influence and experi-
ence on both sides of the Atlantic.
As an auxiliary, the company publishes a monthly
paper entitled The American Reporter and Intending
Emigrant's Guide. This sheet is devoted exclusively
to the interests of the association, and the subjects upon
which it treats are those most likely to arrest the atten-
tion of persons contemplating emigration.
The management of the company appears to be en-
trusted to Mr. John Williams, a man of singular energy
and ability, and the profits of the company, according
to rumor, are very considerable.
TERMS UPON WHICH THE COMPANY TRANSACT Busi-
ness, i. They exact a fee of one dollar, in all cases,
upon application. 2. When operatives are ordered to
be sent forward, they charge for skilled workmen, in-
cluding mechanics of every kind, miners, gardeners,
7 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
etc., ten dollars each; railroad and agricultural labor-
ers, six dollars each; females for domestic and farm
labor, five dollars each; boys learning trades, five dol-
lars each. 3. They receive commission from ship-owners
for ocean passage, also on inland tickets issued from the
sea-board to place of destination, say, upon average,
fifteen per cent. 4. I am told they take the Emigrant's
fare in gold and pay the same in American currency,
also, profiting by the exchange of money, drafts, etc.
5. They are interested to some extent in the speculation
of the various land companies, receiving a bonus for any
sale made through their agency. . .
(3) Advertisements by an Agent.
Missouri Democrat, May 15, 1865.
. . . I am about to enter upon the great enterprise
of inducing labor and capital to Missouri. I have been
honored with an appointment from Governor Fletcher,
as a Commissioner on the Board of Immigration. Al-
ready my duties have led to an extensive correspondence
with leading parties in England and Scotland, and con-
sequent upon this appointment, the American Emigrant
Company of New York have designated me their agent
for Missouri. This company has been formed under
the auspices of leading members of our government, of
the Immigration Bureau at Washington, and of leading
merchants, bankers, senators and representatives, chiefly
in the Eastern States. It has been "chartered for the
purpose of procuring and assisting emigrants from for-
eign countries to settle in the United States." The Com-
pany has a paid up capital of $540,000. The direct ad-
vantages are these:
i st. It secures a supply of diversified labor necessary
to develop the varied resources of the country, and to
prosecute every branch of industry.
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 79
2nd. It offers facilities for large corporations or spe-
cial industrial interests to import in sufficient quantity
the special kind of labor which they require.
3rd. It gives each individual employer the opportun-
ity of supplying himself with the exact number and de-
scription of operatives he needs.
4th. It will tend to equalize the value of labor in
Europe and America, and thus by raising the rate of
wages in the Old World, undermine and finally destroy
its manufacturing supremacy.
5th. It opens by its agencies, new sources of immigra-
tion, and aims at the introduction in large numbers of a
superior class of men from Northern Europe, Belgium,
France, Switzerland, as well as Germany, England,
Scotland and Wales.
My books of registry are now open for inspection, and
according to instructions, I shall make free use of our
daily press with all communications bearing upon the
material and moral interests of my adopted State.
To railroad companies, mining companies, manufac-
turers of iron and steel, machinists, boiler makers, ship
and house builders, manufacturers of all kinds, as well
as to the farming interests generally, I now tender my
best services, and shall be happy to meet all my old
friends in my new position. THOMAS E. SOUPER,
Agent American Emigrant Company.
Democrat Office Buildings, N.E. cor. Fourth and Pine
Sts.
Missouri Democrat, May 15 to May 23, 1865. .
The American Emigrant Company is now prepared
to bring out passengers from Great Britain and Ireland
either by Steam or Sailing ship.
Passengers, especially females and children coming
under the protection of this Company, will be carefully
8o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
attended to by its Agents, at the port of departure and
arrival, and promptly forwarded to their destination.
Passage in all cases at the lowest going rates. Apply
to THOMAS E. SOUPER,
Agent American Emigrant Company.
LABORERS OF EVERY KIND SUPPLIED. The American
Emigrant Company is now prepared to supply miners,
puddlers, machinists, blacksmiths, moulders, and me-
chanics of every kind ; also, gardeners, railroad and farm
laborers and female help at short notice and on reason-
able terms. For particulars apply to
THOMAS E. SOUPER,
Agent American Emigrant Company.
IMPORTANT TO FARMERS and other employers of la-
bor. The American Emigrant Company is in expecta-
tion of the arrival this summer of a large number of
Swedish emigrants of both sexes, and is ready to con-
tract with farmers and other employers of labor, for the
delivery in given localities, of companies varying from
twenty to fifty of the same. The opportunity is a most
favorable one for the supply of this superior class of
labor. Address, at once, for particulars
THOMAS E. SOUPER,
Agent American Emigrant Company.
(b) THE CHINESE
(i) To supplement the Negro.
Memphis Daily Avalanche, July 16, 1869. On July 13 to 15, 1869, a
convention, arranged by southern capitalists and planters, was held
at Memphis, Tennessee, on the subject of labor immigration. The
committee on finance, General Pillow, chairman, recommended the
organization of a stock company to supply planters with laborers. The
committee on transportation reported the figures made by the Union
Pacific Railroad "for the transportation of Chinese from California to
Memphis, forty-four dollars and seventy cents in lots of five hundred
and upward." Philadelphia Inquirer, July 21, 1869. The committee
on Chinese Labor submitted the following report.
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 8
The committee assumes it is the sense of this Conven-
tion, that even if the present labor element among us
could be utilized and profitably employed, it would still
be utterly inadequate to the wants of the Southern and
South-western States, and that we not only have ample
room and superior inducements to offer to European
immigration, but that it is also desirable and necessary
to look to the teeming population of Asia for assistance
in the cultivation of our soil and the development of our
industrial interests; and that China, especially, is ca-
pable of supplying us with a class of laborers peculiarly
adapted to our circumstances and the necessities of our
situation. . . The idea, then, that there is any danger
of too great an accession to our population, provided it
be of the kind we desire, is simply the madness of the
moon. And if God in His providence, has opened up
the door for the introduction of the Mongolian race to
our fields of labor, instead of repelling this class of pop-
ulation as heathens and idolaters, whose touch is con-
taminating, would we not exhibit more of the spirit of
Christians by falling in with the apparent leadings of
Providence, and whilst we avail ourselves of the phys-
ical assistance these pagans are capable of affording us,
endeavor at the same time to bring to bear upon them the
elevating and saving influence of our holy religion, so
that when those coming among us shall return to their
own country, they may carry back with them and dis-
seminate the good seed which is here sown, and the New
World shall thus in a double sense become the regen-
erator of the Old.
The question specially referred to the consideration
of your Committee is as to the best means of introducing
this Asiatic labor, and this is the question of paramount
importance to our people. Your committee has con-
82 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
versed fully and freely with Mr. Koopmanschaap, the
agent of California Chinese Immigration, who has a
large experience in that field of enterprise ; and also with
Mr. Tye Kim Orr, a native Chinaman of intelligence
and cultivation, who has travelled a great deal, and is
perfectly familiar with our language and habits.
The information derived from the gentlemen has sat-
isfied your committee of the very great difference be-
tween different classes of Chinamen, and the great care
and caution that will be necessary in procuring supplies
that may be ordered by our people, since those following
mechanical pursuits or lounging about the towns and
cities of China are wholly unfit for agricultural pur-
suits and very frequently are of a malicious and unre-
liable character, while those of the rural districts of
China are industrious, docile and competent agricultural
laborers and exhibit as much fidelity in the performance
of their duties and obligations as any people in the
world.
Mr. Koopmanschaap did not come prepared to make
engagements for the delivery of laborers here now, but
the chief object of his visit was to acquaint himself with
the wants of our people, and the extent of the demand,
which he finds to be much greater than he anticipated;
and his purpose is to return to California without delay,
and make a special visit to China with a view to make
some definite arrangements commensurate with the de-
mand, information of which will be communicated to
the public here at the earliest period practicable. His
present estimates of the expenses incident to employing
Chinese labor are to a great extent conjectural. He
thinks that laborers can be transported from some Chi-
nese port to Memphis via San Francisco and the Pacific
Railroad in some six weeks, or two months at the out-
side, and delivered here at an expense not exceeding one
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 83
hundred dollars per head. He supposes the companies
he represents will be willing to deliver them here at
that rate, guaranteeing the laborers to be of the descrip-
tion ordered or represented, the transportation money
to be secured and paid on delivery of the laborer at
Memphis.
As to the rate of wages, and reimbursement of the
transportation money, those are matters of contract,
which must be ultimately controlled, as all such ques-
tions are, by the law of demand and supply. The wages
these laborers receive in China are merely nominal, but
in California, the urgency of the demand in the mines
and upon the railroads, has fixed the wages of labor at a
figure that we would be unwilling to meet. The first
importation made by us will doubtless be the most ex-
pensive, and the monthly wages, exclusive of rations,
will, perhaps, be from eight to twelve dollars. These
estimates are, however, as already remarked, merely
conjectural ; and in a great enterprise like this, so insep-
arably connected with our progress and prosperity, in-
dividually, and as a people, we must practice the virtues
of patience and perseverance, submit to temporary sac-
rifice, and be hopeful of the future. Two facts are
patent- China has the labor that we need, and it can be
procured to an unlimited extent. When the supply of
this labor becomes a business, competition will of course
spring up, and the expense of procuring it will be re-
duced to a minimum which must fall far below the ex-
penses incident to our present labor system, whilst its
great advantage over that system, and the impetus it will
impart to all of our industrial interest, will, it is confi-
dently believed, very soon silence all objections, and re-
move all the prejudices now existing in the minds of
our people. Respectfully submitted,
J. W. CLAPP, Tennessee, Chairman; WlRT ADAMS,
84 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Mississippi; G. W. GIFT, Tennessee; L. C. GARRETT,
Arkansas; J. C. GOODLOE, Alabama; W. H. SUTTON,
Louisiana ; J. PATTON ANDERSON, Tennessee ; - - Du-
PREE, Louisiana; E. RICHARDSON, Louisiana.
On motion of Judge Sutton, the report was adopted.
(2) To counteract the Knights of St. Crispin.
The Springfield Republican, June 17, 1870, p. 8, col. 2.
The van of the invading army of Celestials, seen in a
vision by Wendell Phillips, greatly feared by all demo-
crats, and not particularly welcomed by anybody, ex-
cept in dire necessity, have arrived at North Adams, in
the persons of seventy-five Chinamen engaged by C. T.
Sampson to man his shoe factories, and free him from
the cramping tyranny of that worst of American trades-
unions, the "Knights of St. Crispin." These men were
engaged in San Francisco through a Chinese business
firm, by Mr. Chase of North Adams, who went out for
that purpose. They are to be paid twenty-three dollars
a month the first year, twenty-six dollars a month for the
second and third years, and sixty dollars a month to Ah
Sing, their foreman, who speaks and writes English
fluently. Their passage is paid to Adams, their quarters
and fuel furnished, but they of course board and clothe
themselves. If any man be worthless, the San Francisco
house forfeits twenty-five dollars and sends another in
his place. The most sacred part of the Chinaman's re-
ligion, his body's burial with his ancestors, is also nom-
inated in the bond, Sampson pledging to box up each
corpse and send it to Kwong Chong Wing Company in
Frisco, who will take charge of the rest of it. . .
The Boston Commonwealth, June 25, 1870, p. 2, col. 2.
They are with us! the "Celestials" -with almond eyes,
pigtails, rare industry, quick adaptation, high morality,
and all - seventy- five of them -hard at work in the town
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 85
of North Adams, making shoes. And their employer,
and all the neighbors, say they are excellent in skill and
deportment, ready learners, respectful and obedient,
and almost as good as the same number of intelligent
American workmen. These "Celestials" belong to no
striking organizations -do not care to be out nights-
don't worry about their pay-do not presume to dictate
to their employer -and have situations guaranteed to
them for three years. And the secret of it all is this:
the Crispins of that town not only sought to establish
their own pay and hours, but they demanded the dis-
charge of their associates delinquent on the lodge-books
of their organizations. Refusing to accede to this dicta-
tion, their employer, Mr. Sampson, saw the entire crowd
of members in good standing with the lodge leave the
shop, and himself, with unfilled contracts, on the brink
of ruin. Being a man of energy he bethought him of the
Chinese, of whom favorable reports had reached him
as shoemakers in California. Thither he at once posted,
and in a few weeks seventy-five of their countrymen
entered the handsome village of North Adams, and in a
day or two were at work in the deserted factory; while
all Crispendom, near and remote, have since been watch-
ing the experiment, in mortal fear that their occupation
is gone.
Now comes the question of the hour. Shall we give
welcome to these Asiatic mechanics? It is a hard thing
to supplant native workmen with them. But it is a hard-
er thing to be dominated in our enterprise and industry
by a secret, oath-bound labor organization, that listens
to no reason, and whose practice is to rule or ruin. Mr.
Sampson has solved for himself the problem. He is
to be a free man -free to make his contracts, and con-
duct his business as he will, as well as nominally free
86 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
under the guarantees of the law; and he has only done
what every man of spirit and energy should do, if pos-
sible-triumphed over every obstacle that hindered the
development of his prosperity, so long as he deprived no
other man of his liberty to work, to accumulate, to rise
in the social scale. That he is not a reckless and un-
principled man is shown that he has at once commenced
the education of his new help, and some of them have
ventured voluntarily into the Sunday-school connected
with his church. We cannot question that American civ-
ilization can absorb this new element, moulding all races
into one superior, predominant class. We have infinite
trust in that Wisdom which made of one blood all na-
tions to adapt this ancient people to the new world.
Annoying as may be the perturbations of labor in the
process, we believe that the nation, civilization, and hu-
manity, will be benefited by this commingling of the
races.
The Boston Investigatory July 6, 1870, p. 78, col. i.
THE VOICE OF FREE LABOR. A large and enthusiastic
meeting of the workingmen of this city was held in Tre-
mont Temple last Wednesday afternoon and evening.
Its object was to take some measures relative to the im-
portation of coolie labor into Massachusetts. Many
speeches were made, the substance of which is embodied
in the following Resolutions passed by the meeting:
WHEREAS, efforts are now being made to introduce
into the manufactories of this state coolie labor from
China in order to cheapen, and, if possible, degrade the
intelligent, educated loyal labor of Massachusetts, there-
fore be it
RESOLVED, that while we welcome voluntary laborers
from every clime, and pledge them the protection of our
laws, and the assurance of equal opportunities in every
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 87
field of industry, still we cannot but deprecate all at-
tempts to introduce into the manufactories of this State
a servile class of laborers from China, or elsewhere, who
come in fulfilment of contracts made on foreign soil,
and with no intention to become American citizens or
aid in the permanent development of American re-
sources.
RESOLVED, that in the language of the Massachusetts
Bill of Rights, Government is instituted for the common
good, for the protection, safety, and happiness of the
people, and not for the profit, honor, or private interest
of any one man, family, or class of men. Therefore, the
people alone have an incontrovertible, unalienable and
indefeasible right to institute government, and to re-
form, alter, or totally change the same when their pro-
tection, safety, property, or happiness require it; and
we, therefore, declare our fixed and unalterable purpose
to use the power of the ballot to secure the protection,
safety, property, and happiness of the working people of
this commonwealth as against this new attempt of cap-
ital to cheapen labor and degrade the working classes
by importing coolie slaves for that purpose.
RESOLVED, that we tender our thanks to the Hon.
Henry Wilson for his earnest efforts to secure the pass-
age of a law prohibiting the fulfilment on American soil
of these infamous contracts for coolie labor, and we call
upon our representatives in Congress to use all their in-
fluence to secure the passage of such a law as is due alike
to the best interests of the country, as well as a measure
of justice to the coolie, who, ignorant of the value of
labor, accepts conditions degrading alike to him and to
us.
RESOLVED, that the conduct of the Massachusetts Leg-
islature, in twice refusing to take action calculated to
88
AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
check the introduction of the coolie system into this
state, deserves the rebuke and condemnation of every
working man in the State, as well as the condemnation
of every man who believes in the dignity of labor or the
supremacy of liberty over tyranny.
RESOLVED, that we ignore all elements, whether in this
meeting or out, which have for their tendency the
strengthening of any man's chance for political honors
who is not pledged to represent the greatest number of
the people for the people's good, and who is not willing
to be held accountable to the people for his political
actions.
RESOLVED, that we have voted for protection to Ameri-
can industry at the suggestions of the rich manufacturers
who owned the protected products, thinking to help our-
selves, but we now find that, under the scheme of pro-
tection, capital is to get the protection and American
labor is to be reduced to the Chinese standard of rice
and rats, and we cut loose, now and forever, from the
false and lying knaves who have beguiled us.
RESOLVED, that the rights of workingmen will gain no
successful foothold in Massachusetts until the working-
men repudiate those time serving politicians who think
to retain office at any price of double dealing.
RESOLVED, that we cordially endorse the course of
Hon. Henry K. Oliver, Chief of the Bureau of Labor
Statistics, and his assistants, for the able report on the
condition of labor in this State, and pledge ourselves
all the aid in our power by collecting and placing be-
fore the people the true condition and needs of the work-
ing classes.
5. EMPLOYERS' ASSOCIATIONS
The sudden and aggressive organization of unions in 1863 and 1864 u
indicated by the defensive organization of employers. The only doc-
uments emanating from these organizations which have been discov-
ered, have come by way of the labor papers. Some of them are
fragmentary and perhaps garbled; but the following from Fincher's
Trades' Review seem to be authentic, and they are typical.
(a) FOUNDRYMEN
The molders, whose international president, William H. Sylvis, was
the recognized leader of the National Labor Union, were perhaps
the most aggressive and wide-spread of the labor organizations of the
sixties.
(i) Address of the Iron Founders' and Machine Builders' Association
of the Falls of the Ohio.
Fincher's Trades' Review, Oct. 3, 1863.
It is a well known fact that there has been in existence
for more than two years in the city of Louisville, and al-
most every other city of the United States, an association
called the "Iron Moulders' Union," which has now
gained such strength that it is making its power felt, and
in a manner very injurious to the interest of the public,
as also to that of the worthier members of the "Union"
itself. Its ostensible purpose, according to the pub-
lished Constitution, is, "To elevate the moral, social and
intellectual condition of every moulder in the country."
This is, no doubt, a very laudable object -one which
commands the sympathy of all right-thinking men, and
no one would aid the association in obtaining such an
end more willingly than the employers of the members
of the "Union" themselves.
In examining, however, the Constitution and the prac-
tical workings of the "Iron Moulders' Union," it be-
comes at once apparent that this is not the real or only
9 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
object in view, for it will be seen that Section 3, Article
IX, of their Constitution provides: "No employer can
become a member of this 'Union,' nor shall any member,
becoming an employer, remain a member thereof."
And Section 2 of the same Article does not even permit
a foreman, when he has in any way become interested in
the profits of an establishment to remain in the "Mould-
ers' Union." Thus it will be seen that instead of calling
upon the employers to co-operate with their Union in
advancing the "moral, social, and intellectual condition
of every moulder," which self-evidently is a matter of
common interest, the "Moulders' Union" even goes so
far as to expel a member as soon as he has, by his superior
skill and industry, succeeded in establishing himself in-
dependently in business, and thus accomplished one of
the avowed objects of the Union. This fact alone in-
dicates, if other proofs were wanting, that the "Mould-
ers' Union" look upon their employers as their enemies.
Their arbitrary interference with the business manage-
ment of their employers proves this to be the leading
principle of the association.
The "Moulders' Union" has made an attempt, and
thus far a successful one, to dictate to and extort the most
unreasonable terms from their employers all over the
country- terms which, if submitted to, must eventually
prove ruinous to the moulders themselves, since it would
destroy our whole business. They have undertaken to
arbitrarily decide, not only as to what wages must be
paid, but even as to the number of apprentices each shop
is to employ, the kind and amount of work the laborers
in our foundries may or may not be allowed to do, and
to prevent any moulder from working in a shop who is
not a member of their Union.
These and numerous other equally unreasonable and
alii' iioduuiunun'
" i*
rrn I i '
DAILY I:\LMV; \oi< i
^WrTRADET REVIEW
_ Stor.fr ,f lif (,, lf , tf ,, . . '^.W,
f f)rtinii| (tlusn
"
|ji Pwympu.
-~ : - , ' -"
P^flOixJe^ -.,
TYPICAL TITLE PAGES OF LABOR PAPERS OF THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD
LABOR CONDITIONS 93
inadmissible interferences of the "Iron Moulders'
Union " cannot be submitted to any longer without los-
ing not only our business but our self-respect.
Now, therefore, in order to protect ourselves against
the injurious interferences of the "Iron Moulders'
Union," or any other similar association now existing or
that may hereafter be formed, we, the undersigned
foundrymen and machine builders and employers of
other iron workers of Louisville, New Albany, and Jef-
fersonville, have formed a regularly organized associa-
tion to be entitled the "Iron Founders' and Machine
Builders' Association of the Falls of the Ohio," and do
therefore adopt the following as the principle of our
organization:
ist. We deny the right of the "Iron Moulders'
Union," or any other Union, to arbitrarily determine
the wages of our employees, regardless of their merits
and the value of their services to us, and we are opposed
to every combination which has for its object the regula-
tion of wages, whether it be among the employers, for
the purpose of keeping down wages, or among em-
ployees, for the purpose of forcing up wages. We de-
sire the utmost individual liberty both for employers
and employees. The demand for and the supply of
labor, the merits of each individual workman, and the
cost of living, are the natural causes which should reg-
ulate wages. Under the free operation of these causes,
the skillful and industrious workman can always feel
secure of obtaining the highest wages.
2nd. We deny the right of the "Iron Moulders'
Union" to determine for us how many apprentices we
should employ. According to Article VII, Section 7, of
their constitution, they dictate to their employers that
not more than one apprentice shall be employed' in each
94 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
machine foundry, and one to every fifteen moulders in
each stove foundry. This arbitrary interference in our
business cannot be defended upon any grounds of right
and justice. It is an assault upon the individual liberty
of the citizen ; it is an act against the laws of society and
trade, according to which the expansion or profitable-
ness of any branch of business should determine the num-
ber of persons that shall engage in it, and each citizen
ought to be left free to choose for himself.
The interests of the whole country may require today
double the number of moulders that it required a year
ago, but the "Iron Moulders' Union," constituting
themselves legislators, determine for the whole country
how many moulders there shall be, independent of the
requirements of this branch of industry, and thus sacri-
fice to their own selfishness the best interests of the whole
community.
3rd. We shall resist by all legal means, at ev-
ery sacrifice of time and money, all attempts of any set of
men arbitrarily to regulate the supply of labor in any de-
partment of trade and business. While we protest
against the attempt of the "Moulders' Union" to deter-
mine the number of apprentices that shall be employed
in each foundry, we shall cheerfully co-operate with
them in their efforts to thoroughly educate all appren-
tices and make them masters of their business; and we
further protest against every attempt on the part of the
"Iron Moulders' Union" to prescribe to our employees
what kind of work they shall or shall not perform. Sec-
tion 8 of Article VII of their Constitution provides : "No
member of this Union shall permit any helper to ram his
flasks." This clause exhibits a dispostion on the part of
the moulders to prevent the laboring man from acquir-
ing knowledge and bettering his condition. While it is
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 95
of little consequence to us if a moulder insists upon do-
ing laboring work which can be performed as well by
less skilful hands, yet we protest against the spirit of
such enactments, which we consider alike degrading to
those who originate them as to those on whom they are
to be enforced.
COURSE OF ACTION, ist. The corresponding secre-
tary of the "Iron Founders' and Machine Builders' As-
sociation of the Falls of the Ohio" shall put himself into
communication with all the parties of the principal cities
of the United States engaged in similar business to that of
the members of this association and suffering under the
same grievances. He shall take the necessary steps to
secure their co-operation in all the measures to be taken
in our and their own defense. He shall endeavor to
cause the interested parties in other cities to form similar
associations to ours, and in case he succeeds in doing so,
he shall transact all business through the officers of said
associations. But in case no associations can be formed,
or before they can be organized, the corresponding sec-
retary shall correspond with the individual firms of
other cities.
3d. To those of our employees who see that we ask
nothing but what is reasonable, and who desire to with-
draw from the u lron Moulders' Union," or who may be
in favor of changing the Constitution of their society in
those particulars to which we take exception, we prom-
ise and guarantee full protection to their persons and
their property. Should any personal violence be of-
fered to those of our employees who prefer to obey the
dictates of reason, right, and liberty, in preference to
those of the "Moulders' Union," or should any threats
be made to them directly or indirectly by any member of
the said Union, we will use all our influence and means
96 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
to see that the laws of the land shall be fully enforced
against such conspirators against the individual rights
of the citizen and the peace of the community.
4th. Should the employees in any of our establish-
ments stop work in order to force their employers to
submit to unreasonable demands, the members of the
"Iron Founders' and Machine Builders' Association of
the Falls of the Ohio," and the members of the associa-
tions of other cities, or the establishments who have
agreed to act in concert with these associations, shall not
employ any men engaged in such strike. The names of
the parties engaged in any attempt to force their em-
ployers to submit to unreasonable demands shall be sent
in a circular at the expense of this Association to all the
other associations or establishments with which we are
in correspondence, in order that they may be prevented
from getting employment until they either withdraw
from the "Moulders' Union," or cease to attempt the en-
forcing of their unjust demands. Similar circulars re-
ceived from the associations or establishments in other
cities shall be respected by this Association in like man-
ner.
Finally, the object of all the measures which the
"Iron Founders' and Machine Builders' Association of
the Falls of the Ohio" propose to take is self-protection.
We have not united for the purpose of oppressing our
employees ; we only desire not to be oppressed ourselves.
We have not united for the purpose of encroaching upon
the rights of workmen, but we also possess rights as em-
ployers which we do not wish to see encroached upon.
We desire that every workman should be paid liberally
for the work he performs, and we shall comply with
every just demand that may be made upon us. We also
desire to cultivate a feeling of friendship and confidence
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 97
between the employee and employers, and will resist
every attempt of those who wish to create a feeling of
hostility and hatred between us.
Given under our hands this 3rd day of September,
1863.
WM. H. GRANGER, Agent, Phoenix Foundry; DEN-
NIS LONG, Union Foundry; AlNSLlE, COCHRAN AND
COMPANY, Louisville Foundry and Machine Shop;
MILLER AND MOORE, Louisville Agricultural Works;
SNEAD AND COMPANY, Market Street Foundry; E.
BARBAROUX, Hydraulic Foundry and Machine Shop;
GEORGE MEADOWS, Hope Foundry; PEARSON AND Ai-
KIN, Variety Foundry; BRIDGEFORD AND COMPANY,
Louisville Stove and Grate Foundry; J. S. LlTHGOW
AND COMPANY, Eagle Foundry; HAYS AND COOPER,
Wagon and Plow Manufacturers; A. H. PATCH AND
COMPANY, Agricultural Works; J. O. CAMPBELL AND
COMPANY, Kentucky Machine Works ; INMAN, GAULT
AND COMPANY, Washington Foundry; R. G. KYLE AND
COMPANY, Stove Foundry; THOS. PAWSON AND COM-
PANY, American Foundry, New Albany; ALBERT FlNK,
Supt. Bridges, Machinery and Rolling Stock, Louisville
& Nashville Railroad Company.
(2) New England.
Pinchers Trades' Review, May 28, 1864.
New Haven, Conn., April 11, 1864.
GENTLEMEN : A few weeks since several parties em-
ploying bench molders, were seriously interfered with
in the management of their business, by the "Interna-
tional Iron Moulders' Union," who, through "Com-
mittees," told them how many apprentices, they might
employ, how many molds should be a day's work, the
number of hours for a day, and the amount of wages
therefor. This the employers considered as an osurpa-
98 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
tion of their own legitimate rights, and decided not to
accede to the demands of the "Committee."
And in order that they might act understandingly,
and mutually protect each other, a call was hastily is-
sued from New Britain, for the employers of bench
molders in the immediate vicinity to meet at New Ha-
ven, Tuesday, March 8th, 1864, to form an "American
Iron Founders' Association." The meeting was well
attended, its object fully discussed, and all present
joined the organization proposed; but in order that a
more extensive association might be formed, the meet-
ing adjourned to meet at the Astor House, in New York,
on Tuesday, March 29th. This meeting was well at-
tended; parties from New England, New York, New
Jersey and Pennsylvania, being present. By invitation
from the meeting, a delegation from the "Iron Founders'
Union, of New York and vicinity," met with it, and as
at the previous meeting, the unanimous feeling was that
the necessity of an organization of the employers must
be apparent to all, who desire to manage their own busi-
ness, without being controlled by outside "Committees"
or "Strikes" and that such an organization would be
beneficial to both them and their employees; and after
some discussion it was decided to extend this association
so as to include employers of floor molders throughout
the country, and a committee was appointed to present
to the next meeting, a revised constitution and by-laws,
and board of officers; and the secretary was instructed
to issue an invitation to all parties (whose address he
obtained), employing either bench or floor molders, to
attend the next meeting. The meeting then adjourned
to meet at the Astor House, New York city, on Tuesday,
April 1 9th, 1864, at 3 o'clock, p.m.
You are earnestly invited to be present at that meeting,
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 99
as business of importance to all employers of bench or
floor molders will be brought before it. If business pre-
vents your attendance at the same, we trust you will con-
fer with the founders in your vicinity, and endeavor to
have at least one delegate to this National Association.
In order that the meeting may be acquainted with
your views of this important subject, you will confer a
great favor if you will sign one of the within replies and
mail in the enclosed envelope as early a day as conven-
ient (this week if possible, enclosing two dollars, if you
desire to join the Association, as your membership fee,
as provided in its constitution) . Very respectfully yours,
HENRY A. WARNER, Secretary of the Association.
(3) Michigan.
Fincher's Trades' Review, July 8, 1865.
Employers' Private Circular. Received by the Underground Railroad.
Detroit, Mich., May 29, 1865.
DEAR SIR: I send you to-day, by mail, a printed no-
tice, expressive of the position taken by all the principal
foundries here, and in the vicinity, with regard to em-
ploying molders belonging to, or acting with, MoJders'
Unions. We commend the action set forth in the notice
to your earnest consideration.
Nearly all the foundries in this city are connected
with Machine and Blacksmith Shops, which, alto-
gether, constitute one establishment. These establish-
ments, or such of them as are of importance, act in con-
cert in all matters of common interest. We classify
work, and agree on minimum rates. We classify labor,
and agree on maximum wages. If a man honorably
leaves one establishment, and offers his services to an-
other, the latter, if it sets him at work, pays him no more
than the first, until being satisfied, on full trial, that he
is fairly entitled to more, never exceeding, however, the
ioo AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
maximum rates. If an employee leaves one establish-
ment, on a "strike," all other establishments refuse to
employ him at all, so long as he holds out. It is also
contrary to our rules for one establishment to employ an
apprentice coming from another establishment before
his indented time has expired.
It seems to us here, that were such rules in force be-
tween the establishments of the different cities of the
country, the result would be greatly to our mutual ad-
vantage. Enclosed, I hand you a list of molders, who
"struck" here not long since, because their wages were
reduced from three dollars to two dollars and seventy-
five cents per day. I raise and submit the question,
whether it is good policy for establishments, in other
cities, to give them employment, in case they apply for
it- the object being to break up the habit of "striking"
without cause, and so break up the factious interference
of the Trades' Unions. In this, we presume, you agree
with us.
We, of this city, are impressed with importance of
employers forming counter organizations, as a means of
protection against the evils and abuses of these meddle-
some unions, the former being made co-extensive with
the latter. Granting this to be so, the question is, how
can this best be done? Several plans have been sug-
gested :
1. The formation of associations in every city where
the aforenamed establishments exist, leaving it for these
separate associations to regulate by treaty all matters
which concern them in common.
2. The formation of a national association with a
branch in each city, where an establishment is located -
the national association to act on matters of common in-
terest.
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 101
3. The formation of local associations, as above; and
then let these local associations, which are similarly sit-
uated, or the elements of whose business are so much
alike as to admit of it, form a general association, or a
kind of congress, to be composed of delegates, chosen by
the local associations, on a basis of representation, which
shall be fair and equal. Some are of the opinion that
this congress should have power to regulate and fix,
from time to time, the minimum price to be charged for
work, and the maximum rate to be paid as wages ; and
to establish rules respecting "strikes" and "strikers,"
runaway apprentices, and the like.
It is believed, that all the Lake Cities, and such as are
on their connecting rivers, might properly be brought
under the same congress, and perhaps Pittsburg, Cin-
cinnati, Louisville and St. Louis, should be included.
A like congress, or general association, might be
formed by the associations in the cities of Portland, Bos-
ton, Hartford, New Haven, Baltimore, Philadelphia,
New York, Albany, Troy, and many others, which are
situated substantially alike as to the cost of living, the
price of stock, and of labor.
These two congresses, the eastern and western, might
adopt the same rules respecting "strikers," runaway ap-
prentices, and trades' unions.
It is the prevailing opinion here, that if the establish-
ments in the various cities, east and west, will adopt and
carry out the policy of not giving employment to run-
away apprentices, or to journeymen going from one
place or establishment to another, on a "strike," it would
arrest and overcome the principal mischief resulting
from the trades' unions, if not effectually break them up
as organizations. It is obvious, that such a step would
at least operate as an efficient check on the practice of
102 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
"striking" without cause, and against reason. It appeals,
then, with great force to our early attention.
The third plan above suggested, receives the approval
of the establishments of this city, and of the east, so far
as we are advised.
In conclusion, let me urgently request you to reply to
this communication as soon as convenient, and in your
reply, state your views in the premises, and also as to the
expediency of calling a convention of the employers,
connected with the aforesaid establishments, in the west;
and if you deem such a call expedient, when, where, and
how, should it be made?
By order of the Executive Committee of the Iron
Workers 7 Association of Detroit. Respectfully and
truly yours, WM. WARNER, Chairman.
(b) BUILDING TRADES
Fincher's Trades' Review, Feb. 20, 1864.
To THE ARCHITECTS, MASONS AND BUILDERS OF NEW
YORK: At a Special Meeting of the Boss Plasterers'
Protective Association, held at their rooms, No. 150
Fourth Avenue, on Monday evening, a^th ult., the fol-
lowing preamble and resolutions having been adopted
by the Society, we would respectfully submit them for
your consideration.
WHEREAS, the members of the Journeymen Plaster-
ers' Operative Society, through the columns of the pub-
lic press, given notice to the several boss plasterers of
New York, that on and after the ist day of February
next, they will demand twenty shillings per day, the
main object of which, should they be successful in en-
forcing it, is to pave the way for more arbitrary meas-
ures, such as abolishing the present mode of lathing,
which gives employment to several and forwards the in-
terests of the business to a considerable extent, which
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 103
purpose is a violation, not only of those who are at pres-
ent employed at lathing, but also of the boss plasterers.
AND WHEREAS, the members of the Journeymen Plas-
terers' Operative Society may at any time enforce any
rate of wages that may be agreed upon by their associa-
tion, without giving the boss plasterers a reasonable and
sufficient notice thereof.
AND WHEREAS, we, the boss plasterers, have not only
the interests of the journeymen plasterers to take care
of, but also the interest of those employed at lathing,
and also of the apprentices learning the trade of plaster-
ing, and that it is for the protection of those various in-
terests that your committee will suggest the propriety
of the boss plasterers, now members of this society, and
of all who may hereafter become members, of using
every reasonable means of subverting the members of
the Journeymen's Society from enforcing the unreason-
able demands they at present have in contemplation.
Your committee would also state that it is not from any
course of vindictive feeling they propose the above
measures, but seeing the prospects for the coming season
not warranting such an unreasonable demand.
Therefore, we would respectfully suggest that the
boss plasterers do unite and bind themselves to resist
each and every unjust measure at present in existence in
the Journeymen Plasterers' Association, by placing their
signatures to this preamble, if approved by the Associa-
tion.
And it is unanimously Resolved, that we will not com-
ply with the demand of twenty shillings per day as put
forth by the journeymen plasterers, deeming the present
rate of wages sufficient for the demand thereof.
And in conclusion, be it further Resolved, we would
invite the co-operation of the several Boss Masons to
104 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
sustain us in all purposes which may operate to our
mutual interests.
(c) SHIP BUILDERS
Fincher's Trades' Revifw, April 2, 1864.
Whereas, the various departments of mechanical and
other labor, dependent upon our inland lakes for em-
ployment, having banded themselves together by the
most solemn pledges, under various titles of associations,
and under such organizations, have instituted various
arbitrary rules of dictation, to both employers and own-
ers, rendering themselves obnoxious and detrimental to
every interest of those who contribute to their welfare.
The instability and uncertainty of the movements of
these associations, together with their extremely dic-
tatorial rules, which they are determined to enforce up-
on their employers, and all interested, prompt a move-
ment on our part for our own preservation and self-de-
fence. We, therefore, as owners of vessels, ask you to
lend us your aid and council by your co-operation with
us in our efforts to destroy in its bud an impending evil.
We do not array ourselves against labor -would on the
other hand foster it to the end -but the unions which
have sprung up in our midst, and the positions being
taken, are frightful in the extreme, and none can foretell
the evil that will sooner or later grow out of them, if we
sit still and deal out nourishment to them, and continue
to submit to the ruinous and monstrously exhorbitant
demands they are constantly making upon our prop-
erty and purses, totally regardless of our pecuniary abil-
ity to meet such demands. The day is not far distant,
when they will modestly ask an equal distribution of the
property itself, if not arrested at this point. It is a fear-
ful state of things, when any Society (what ever may be
its object) asserts that this man or that, shall not be
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 105
employed unless he first becomes a member of their
union -and menace him if he does not leave the work;
and that they shall further dictate to the employer, who
and who not he shall employ, without reference to abil-
ity or worth. Our purpose now is, to ask of you to
refrain from the employment of any man upon your
vessels here, to make repairs, at a greater rate of wages
than those established by the Convention of Owners,
held in this city on the tenth inst, viz: two dollars and
fifty cents per day, cash -and, secondly, not to employ
any man who is a member of the "Ship Carpenters' and
Caulkers' Union," until he shall abandon the same
(while they continue to work under their present arbi-
trary rules and regulations), and further, to instruct
your Masters not to employ or aid any member of such
Association -and if necessary to forward our efforts in
this great cause, to abandon all repairs that can possibly
be avoided, and procure the same at some other port-
provided the same cannot be accomplished here by men
who are not members of said association.
Our ship-yards are gradually filling up with good
men from abroad, who are willing to work faithfully
without any restrictions whatever, and for remunerative
wages, viz: two dollars and fifty cents per day. A
little indulgence on your part will greatly aid us in the
destruction of an effort on the part of the Association
that will, if submitted to by us, be a blow to our pecuniary
interests from which we can never recover.
We purpose forming a permanent association to be
known as "the Ship Owners' and Ship Builders' Associa-
tion of Buffalo," of which an adjourned meeting will be
held on Tuesday next, March 15, at 2 o'clock, p.m., at
number 4 E. Swan Street.
We have the hearty co-operation of the N.Y. Central,
106 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
N.Y. and Erie, W.T. Company, Evans and Company,
and other propeller lines, together with a large number
of vessel-owners who have taken hold with alacrity.
We ask your attendance and co-operation either in per-
son or by letter. Yours very respectfully,
D. P. DOBBINS, Chairman.
THOS. D. DOLE, Secretary.
Buffalo, March 12, 1864.
The foregoing circular is fully endorsed as follows:
John Allen Jr., president W.T. Company; T. D.
Dole, agent N.Y.C. Line Propellers; S. D. Caldwell,
agent N.Y. and E. Railroad Propellers; Charles En-
sign, proprietor People's Line Propellers; E. T. Evans
and Company, proprietor Evans' Line Propellers, and
other owners of propellers in port, together with the
representation of one hundred and sixty-seven vessels.
(d) RAILROADS
Fincher's Trades* Review, June 4, 1864.
IMPORTANT. Office of the G. and C.U. Railroad
Company [Galena and Chicago Union] Chicago, May
2, 1864.
To , Esq;
DEAR SIR: The subjoined resolutions were adopted
by the Board of Directors of this company on the twen-
tieth ult., and the following copy thereof is respectfully
presented:
RESOLVED, that the management of railroads is vested
in the Board of Directors, who are elected by the stock-
holders, to manage and control the interest and business
of such corporations, and are by them held responsible
for the proper discharge of their duties. Any and all
combinations of any number or class of employees at-
tempting, or threatening to usurp any portion of this
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 107
control, endangers the value of all property invested in
railroads.
RESOLVED, that we fully recognize the principle that
the rights of employees should never be violated ; that if
by improper treatment, inadequate or insufficient wages,
or uncertainty of payment of the same, they are inju-
riously affected, the right belongs to them to seek indi-
vidually, more satisfactory terms elsewhere; but no
railway management can recognize as a right, any dic-
tation as to the wages they shall pay, the rules or regu-
lations they shall adopt, or whom they shall or shall not
employ; and societies used to prevent free action of
either party in these particulars, if unchecked, would
not only destroy all value in railroad property, but
would strike a destructive blow to the commercial and
agricultural prosperity of the entire country.
RESOLVED, that in the enhanced expenses of living, we
recognize the propriety of increasing wages, and ap-
prove of the action inaugurated by the executive officers
of this road, to take effect the beginning of this year, for
such a judicious increase as would be both fair and
equitable, as between the stockholders we represent, and
the men we employ; and that we remember with dis-
satisfaction, the advantages taken by the engineers at
the close of the past year when this was being considered,
and at a time when such large property interests were
imperiled by the storm, for the presentation of a demand
discourteously expressed, for an increase of pay to all,
whether merited or not; and, further, we approve of the
circular issued, to take effect March i, 1864, both as an
indication that the executive officers of the road under
this board were disposed to assume, and vindicate that
control properly belonging to those who own the road,
and as showing a disposition on their part to so equalize
io8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
and regulate the labor and its remuneration, that a few
over-bearing and over-officious engineers could no
longer claim the highest pay for the least work, to the
disadvantage of those who were ready and willing to
perform their duty.
RESOLVED, that we not only approve, we congratulate
the president, general superintendent and assistant su-
perintendent upon their success in having brought order
out of threatened chaos ; and we commend the firmness
and decision with which they assumed and maintained
a correct position, which has resulted in a proper con-
trol of the property entrusted to their care.
RESOLVED, that while it may be possible for organiza-
tions to be formed, whose purposes shall be "to elevate
the standing of engineers as such, and their characters
as men," they are always in danger of being controlled
by designing men for their own sinister purposes, and of
being brought into collision with a proper management
of railroads, thus jeopardizing the interests of both par-
ties, as has been developed by the organization known
as "The Brotherhood of the Footboard," and we recom-
mend to all engineers who have any character, as men,
to unite with the managers of all railroads in discoun-
tenancing and discontinuing this combination, which
has benefited none, but threatened to be a fertile source
of injury to all.
RESOLVED, that we hereby tender our thanks to the
managers of railroads centering in Chicago for their
assistance and co-operation, and for their prompt rejec-
tion of impracticable terms of dictation, and also to
managers of roads in Eastern States, for their aid in
supplying us with engineers worthy of their positions.
In our opinion a great and lasting benefit has been ef-
fected not to our road alone, but to all other railroads
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 109
wherever located, and to the vast interests of the whole
country dependent upon railroads for prosperity.
RESOLVED, that the secretary prepare copies of these
resolutions, one to be presented to the General Superin-
tendent, one to the assistant superintendent, and one to
each of the superintendents of roads centering in Chica-
go, also to the officers of eastern roads who have ren-
dered to this company their valuable aid and co-opera-
tion. Very respectfully your ob'dt. serv't,
W. M. L., Secretary.
(e) AN ATTEMPTED GENERAL ASSOCIATION
Fincher's Trades' Review, Aug. 13, 1864. From Detroit Tribune, July
25, 1864. Employers' General Association of Michigan.
. . . Whereas, we, the undersigned citizens of
, and interested as owners, or managing agents, in
manufacturing or mechanical business, find the follow-
ing state of things to exist in relation to our various pur-
suits, that is to say: the workingmen have, for a long
time, been associated together in thorough organiza-
tions known as "Trade Unions." And, however laud-
able the motives may have been, in which these "Un-
ions" originated, they have at length come to assume a
dangerous attitude, and to act a disorganizing and ruin-
ous part. For example: they assume to dictate to em-
ployers, and the employed, the rates of wages to be
demanded and paid; what men may be employed, and
what number of apprentices; who shall be discharged,
and who retained; when, and on what terms our estab-
lishments and business may be operated and carried on,
or stopped, always vigilant to take advantage of the
shifting condition of business and work on hand and
having apparently little or no regard to the justice or
proprieties of the case, and enforcing their demands, as
no AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
against the employers, by "strikes," and, as against work-
ingmen by both contributions and threats.
As a natural result of this system of general and per-
sistent interference our business is thrown into a condi-
tion of much uncertainty. Its essential relations are
seriously deranged. Businesslike calculations and ar-
rangements, especially such as involve prices for work,
and time of completion and delivery, are thus rendered
quite impracticable. We cannot enter into contracts
for work of importance, or proceed with it with any
degree of safety, either to ourselves or patrons.
This is not all. These "Unions" prescribe a uniform
rate of wages for each workman of any particular trade.
For instance, they decree that each molder shall be paid
a given sum per day; each finisher another sum; each
blacksmith another; each common laborer another, and
so on with every class.
The pernicious consequences, resulting to labor as
well as to employers, from these uniform rates are such
as should be expected. Discriminations, in favor of
skill and efficiency, are, in a great measure excluded.
The bungler and laggard is placed on the same footing
as the skillful and efficient. Merit receives no recogni-
tion or reward; indeed, it is ignored. As a natural re-
sult, the motive for exertion is taken away. The man of
skill and natural energy sinks down into the habits of
the bungler and inefficient. Original gifts, being de-
prived of a principal incentive, remain undeveloped.
In this way, skill and merit are depressed, and labor is
reduced both in quality and amount.
It is plain enough to all, who will give the matter a
moment of candid thought, that the evils here spoken
of must, in some way, be arrested and overcome, or the
inducements for attempting to continue our business
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 1 1 1
are taken away, and our establishments must shut down.
In this event would be involved consequences to the em-
ployed, the employer, and the public, far more serious
than mere idleness, stopping of business, and lack of
mechanical productions. If continued for any consid-
erable time, it must result in wide-spread beggary, with
all its attending evils -suffering, bread- riots, pillage
and taxation.
Let not our position be misapprehended or misstated.
We feel assured that a great majority of workingmen
are well-disposed, and were they to act freely, in ac-
cordance with their own instinctive good sense, they
would not be found rushing to such extremes, but would
continue steady at their calling, being well pleased with
wages which are abundantly just and equal. But, un-
fortunately, they are not permitted -so to live and act.
They come in contact with others of a different make and
temper- uneasy spirits, pregnant with the leaven of dis-
content, and whose words, constantly dropping, are full
of the seeds of trouble. They are more or less affected
by the association. They are led to join the "Trade
Unions" by dint of the tempting promise, that, by joint
thought and action, they will better their condition.
Here their prejudices are all the time wrought upon.
The object is to make them feel that they have not prop-
erly estimated their rights, or even known what they
really are; that their toil has not been justly rewarded;
that they have been ground down, and their real import-
ance and value not acknowledged or felt. These ever-
recurring representations and appeals, addressed to pas-
sions more easily inflamed than any other, are, of course,
not without effect. These confiding men become en-
listed. They are led on from one step to another, till
at length they are fully committed. An increase of
H2 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
wages, or the discharge of certain men or promising
apprentice boys is proposed, decided on, and demanded.
These men go with the rest, being hurried on by the
excitement of the occasion, by the maddening influence
of sympathy, or by ill-regulated zeal for a common
cause. A strike follows. Work stops. These men are
idle. Their wages are already nearly or quite con-
sumed. The wants of a wife and children press upon
them, as well as their own. They begin to reflect and
relent; and the more they reflect, the more they relent.
They say that they have been deceived and misled ; that
they have been well dealt by, and that they are in the
wrong, quite as much to their own interests as towards
their employers. They desire to return to work at
former rates. They feel that they must. They say that
they will. But now up steps a ringleader, and with
threats and abuse, dilates on their duty of fidelity to
the "Unions" -reproaches them with odious epithets,
calling them cowards, sneaks, traitors, and threatening
to break their heads or burn their houses, if they go to
work on terms different from those decreed by the
"Union." They are intimidated and shrink back.
Now be it observed once for all, that we cordially
accept the principle that "the laborer is worthy of his
hire" -that he should be remunerated for his labor, and
so treated and provided for in general arrangements of
society and of the body politic, as to enable him by dili-
gence and fair economy, to place himself and those
dependent on him on a footing of intellectual and social
equality with others. But, on the other hand, while
we not only recognize this principle as true and funda-
mental, but insist on it, assume it and act on it in prac-
tice, we at the same time feel called upon by a sense of
justice to ourselves and of duty in our character as citi-
nine] LABOR CONDITIONS 113
zens, to firmly remonstrate against these growing evils
and abuses, and make all reasonable efforts to correct
them, and restore our business to a more settled state.
And whereas, being well persuaded,
1. That if the better disposed class of men, when tak-
ing the sober second thought in manner stated, could
but see a strong, intelligent and influential body of em-
ployers thoroughly organized and standing prepared to
afford them protection on their resuming work, they
would gladly break loose from the "Union" and come
back to remain contented, steady and prosperous. And
2. That if workmen should know that employers, here
and elsewhere are thus organized, standing firm on hon-
orable grounds, they would be very slow to join "Un-
ions," and be very ready to withdraw from them, if in,
so soon as they become instruments of mischief. Conse-
quently the "Unions" in such event, would be soon brok-
en up, or at least lose their power for evil. These
ringleaders, now so disorganizing and so troublesome,
would be deserted, nay scouted and cast off. Labor
would be governed by just and natural rules, instead of
faction and caprice; and our various business would
assume a condition as settled as these strangely anoma-
lous times will admit of.
And whereas, actuated by these views, and to accom-
plish these important ends, several classes of owners and
managing agents of our number have already organized
associations under appropriate articles.
And whereas, it is now proposed that to the same end,
all owners and managing agents of the kind herein
named, associate themselves together according to their
several branches of business, to form distinct and co-
ordinate organizations under thoughtfully considered
constitutions, and that the same be auxiliaries'of a gen-
1 14 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
eral association formed of all the various owners and
managing agents united ; and that such general associa-
tion be vested with visitorial powers over the auxiliaries,
and also with appellate jurisdiction in cases arising be-
tween auxiliaries, and between an auxiliary and any of
its members.
Now, therefore, we, owners and managing agents
aforesaid, do hereby associate ourselves together to form
a general association.
II
NATIONAL LABOR UNION
i. PRIOR EFFORTS TOWARD NATIONAL
ORGANIZATION
(a) THE MACHINISTS AND BLACKSMITHS, 1861
Resolution of the International Union of Machinists and Blacksmiths,
from their Proceedings, Nov., 1861. The committee, consisting of
the president, the vice-president, and the secretary, was appointed.
In 1864 the Iron-molders' International Union took similar action,
but no organization resulted.
. . . Whereas, there are many localities within
the jurisdiction of the National Union, where machin-
ists and blacksmiths are employed, but not in sufficient
numbers to sustain a union, in accordance with the con-
stitution of this union; and whereas, other trades are
similarly situated in the same localities, thereby pros-
trating the union sentiment therein ; in order, therefore,
to secure the co-operation of our fellow-craftsmen, be it
RESOLVED, that this National Union appoint a com-
mittee, to consist of members of this union, to re-
quest the appointment of a similar committee from
other national or grand bodies (of Trade Unions) to
meet them, fully empowered to form a National Trades
Assembly, to facilitate the advancement of the interests
of labor, by organizing subordinate trades assemblies in
such localities where separate trade union movements
are impracticable, said subordinate trade assemblies to
possess such powers and privileges as the National
Trades Assembly may ordain. . .
n8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
(b) THE INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRIAL ASSEMBLY
OF NORTH AMERICA, 1864
(x) The Call.
This call appeared as a communication from the Trades' Assembly and
League of Friendship, of Louisville, Kentucky, addressed to Fincher's
Trades' Review, and first published August 13, 1864. The proceed-
ings were printed in Fincher's Trades' Review, October 15, 1864, p.
80. Only one session was held.
To the Officers and Members of the Trades' Assem-
blies that are now organized on the Continent of Amer-
ica, or that may be organized before the twenty-first of
September.
GENTLEMEN : As our notice, which has been insert-
ed in Fine kef's Trades' Review for the last three months,
has failed to elicit a correspondence from all the Trades'
Assemblies that are now organized, we are forced to
adopt this method of communicating with you in regard
to calling an international convention of the trades'
assemblies of the United States and Canada.
We think great results would be produced by organ-
izing ourselves into an international body. Are not cap-
italists and employers of almost every city organizing
themselves into unions, and is it not patent to every one
that their object is the overthrow of our organizations?
Are we to shrink with fear when we behold this spec-
tacle? We answer, no; but it should stimulate us to
powerful exertion; we ought to work with renewed
energy and labor zealously to organize the mechanics
of every branch, and if necessary, laboring men into
protective unions, and draw these unions into interna-
tional bodies, the same as the molders, machinists and
blacksmiths, printers, etc. In a word, the trades' assem-
blies ought to be the agents through which the mechanics
of the different branches will be organized into local
unions, and from local unions to international unions.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 1 19
Suppose that we should be successful in organizing
the mechanics of America as above stated: according
to our views, the result would be this, viz: should the
employers by combination attempt to overthrow any one
branch of the trades, the other branches or organizations
of mechanics would make the cause of the trade or
branch struck at, their cause, and would lend their aid
and sympathy to the trade; for if one branch was over-
thrown, we as a body would be weakened by it, knowing
that the next blow struck might be at our branch, hence
we are bound to protect each other.
There are many other benefits to be derived by com-
binations, but we have not the time nor space to mention
but one more, and we think that it is sufficient of itself
to stir you to action ; it is this, combination will do away
with strikes, for by combination we will become so pow-
erful that the capitalists or employers will cease to re-
fuse us our just demands, and will, if we make any un-
reasonable demands, condescend to come down on a level
with us, and by argument and positive proof, show to us
that our demands are unjust; but this would have to be
explained to the satisfaction of the trades' assembly of
the city in which the demand was made.
We believe there are over two hundred thousand me-
chanics now represented in protective unions in the
United States and Canada, and that they could be
brought under the jurisdiction of the International
Trades' Assembly in less than six months.
Gentlemen, we exhort you to send delegates to the
convention, it will not cost much, and if you do not think
that you will be benefited by it, you can instruct your
delegates to withdraw.
We would suggest that Wednesday, the twenty-first
of September, be named as the day of assembling, and
120 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
that Louisville be the place ; we name Louisville for the
reason that if we have to correspond with each other,
for the purpose of selecting a place, it would take six
months to come to an understanding.
We expect that the first convention will adjourn to
meet about the first of May, 1865, by this date we expect
to see a trades' assembly in nearly every city of the Unit-
ed States and Canada.
Hoping that you will take immediate action on the
subject, and that you will proceed to elect one or two
delegates to represent you, and immediately notify us
of your determination, we remain, fraternally yours,
R. GlLCHRlST, Pres.
(2) The Delegates.
Alex. Burleigh, of Evansville, Indiana; William
Bailey, St. Louis, Missouri ; Thomas C. Knowles, Buf-
falo, New York; Richard Trevellick, M. Sintzenich,
Detroit, Michigan; Robert Gilchrist, C. M. Talmage,
Louisville, Kentucky; S. S. Whittier, Boston, Massa-
chusetts; W. H. Gudgeon, E. F. Bigler, Cincinnati,
Ohio; J. W. Lafflin, Trades' Union League, St. Louis;
John Blake, Chicago.
(3) The Resolutions.
[The Committee on Resolutions (Lafflin and Sint-
zenich) reported the following, which were adopted
except as indicated.]
. . . WHEREAS, education and co-operation being
the permanent ground work of social happiness of all
who earn their bread by the sweat of their brow; there-
fore be it
RESOLVED, that we earnestly urge upon all local trade
assemblies the propriety of taking immediate action to
organize into unions all who labor for support, and
impress upon their minds the necessity of immediate
co-operation in this great movement of reform.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 121
RESOLVED, that this assembly, in the name of the me-
chanics and laboring men of our country, do proclaim
and will maintain, the right of workingmen to be the
[exclusive 17 ] judges of the value of their labor, and the
compensation they are entitled to receive therefor; that
as the creators of wealth they are entitled, equally with
capital, to a fair and equal participation in its benefits ;
and that while we recommend and pledge the utmost
moderation and justice in our demands, we utterly deny
the right of capitalists to affix a standard of value to
wages. We claim this as an inherent right vested in
man -a birthright- we pledge our sacred honor as men
to maintain, at all hazards, and under all circumstances.
But, while thus clearly defining our fundamental rights,
as a measure of courtesy and mutual confidence, we
would recommend in the adjustment of wages, as a pre-
liminary step, consultation with employing capitalists,
with a view to the adoption of a scale of wages which
may be mutually satisfactory to both parties.
RESOLVED, that this assembly believe the present a pro-
pitious time for the various local trades' assemblies to
agitate the justness to all who labor for support, that
eight hours should constitute a legal day's work; and
that those who have the interest of the laboring element
at heart should earnestly canvass this question on all
occasions where it does not conflict with other great
interests at stake until the mind of the working classes
generally be sufficiently imbued with the great advan-
tages, socially and morally, to be derived by this contem-
plated reform.
RESOLVED, that the payment of wages for labor should
be in the lawful currency of the national government, or
banks established, recognized and working under state
laws; and this assembly strongly condemns the practice
17 Struck out on amendment.- EDS.
122 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
of payment in trade, technically known as the "order
system," as a system derogatory to manhood, as opposed
to the dignity and rights of the citizen, fraught with in-
justice and oppression, and which experience has demon-
strated as a means to deprive the sons of toil of their just
reward; force on them merchandise at enhanced prices,
and at such places and on such conditions as the capital-
ists dictates and his cupidity exacts ; therefore, this as-
sembly recommends the mechanics and laboringmen of
our country to take such action on this subject as will
procure the passage of laws by the state legislatures pro-
hibiting this system of oppression, and making its prac-
tice punishable as a misdemeanor.
RESOLVED, that it be enjoined upon the various trades*
assemblies to earnestly advocate, through their members,
the creation of co-operative stores, thereby procuring to
the laboring masses the advantages of the same, and in
furtherance of this object the International Industrial
Assembly recommend to the various local trades' as-
semblies the propriety of starting a grocery and provi-
sion store as soon as practicable.
RESOLVED, that the exercise of the mechanic arts in
the state prisons and penitentiaries by convicted felons,
is a practice derogatory to labor, and calculated to re-
duce its value, and is opposed to the rights and dignity
of free men, and as such ought to be abolished ; and we
recommend workingmen to support no candidate for the
legislative halls of our country unless pledged to the
abolition of this system.
RESOLVED, that arrangements should be made as soon
as practicable to hold a series of mass meetings in differ-
ent sections of our country, on the subject and principles
of protective and co-operative labor organizations.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 123
RESOLVED, that the recent efforts of various trades*
assemblies to ameliorate the condition of the sewing
women, by organizing them into unions for their com-
mon protection, under the auspices and countenance of
the local trades' assemblies, is deserving our highest
praise, and we recommend to the various assemblies a
further and general prosecution of this important re-
form, that a great social canker may be removed from
our midst by those who, in occupation and sympathy,
should be first and foremost in helping the poor, the
helpless and oppressed of the weaker sex.
[The convention endorsed Pinchers Trades' Review,
the Working-man 's Advocate of Chicago, and the Buf-
falo Sentinel; and asked help for the printers locked out
by the Chicago Times.']
(4) The Constitution.
PREAMBLE. Whereas, we recognize in the present ag-
gressive attitude of capital, a combined effort to crush
out the independence and enslave the working masses;
and
WHEREAS, we find that the capitalists have banded
themselves together in secret organization, for the ex-
press purpose of crushing out our manhood; and
WHEREAS, capital has assumed to itself the right to
own and control labor for the accomplishment of its own
greedy and selfish ends, regardless of the laws of nature,
and of nature's God; and
WHEREAS, experience has demonstrated the utility of
concentrated effort in arriving at specific ends; and it is
an evident fact that if the dignity of labor is to be pre-
served, it must be done by our united action ; and,
WHEREAS, believing the truth of the following max-
ims, "That they who would be free, themselves must
124 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
strike the blow," "That in union there is strength," and
"That self-preservation is the first law of nature," and
calling upon God to witness the rectitude of our inten-
tion, we, the delegates here assembled, do ordain and
establish the following Constitution for the government
of the International Industrial Assembly, established
for the purpose of carrying out the object herein con-
templated, assisting and encouraging the laboring class-
es in all sections to stand up manfully for their rights,
and to elevate themselves to the condition of society to
which their great importance justly entitles them. . .
ARTICLE I-TITLE AND OBJECTS: Section i-This
body shall be known and designated as the "Interna-
tional Industrial Assembly of North America."
Section 2 -Its objects shall be,
First-The elevation, socially and morally, of the posi-
tion of the Working Classes of North America.
Second -To use all means consistent with our honor
and integrity, to so correct the abuses under which the
working classes are laboring, as to insure to them their
just rights and privileges.
Third -To use our utmost endeavors to impress upon
the various producing classes the necessity of a close and
thorough organization, and form themselves into local
unions, wherever practicable.
Fourth -To use every honorable means in our power
to adjust difficulties that may arise between employers
and workmen ; to labor assiduously for the development
of a plan of action that may be mutually beneficial to
both parties; to use our influence to discountenance
strikes, except when they become absolutely necessary,
and to devise the best manner of supporting such organ-
izations as may be driven to the necessity of resorting to
such means to force a recognition of their rights.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 125
ARTICLE n- MEMBERSHIP. Section i -This assembly
shall be composed of delegates from each organized
Workingman's Assembly of North America.
Section 2 -Each organized Workingman's Assem-
bly shall be entitled to send as many delegates as they
may see fit, but in no case shall such assembly be en-
titled to more than one vote in this International As-
sembly. . .
2. BALTIMORE CONGRESS, AUGUST, 1866
(a) PRELIMINARY CONFERENCE, MARCH, 1866
Daily Evening Voice (Boston), March 30, 1866, p. 3, col. 6.
The conference on this subject, held at New York on
Monday last, was attended by the following representa-
tives only: coachmakers, Wm. Harding, New York;
tailors, Wm. Cashman, New York; molders, Isaac S.
Neale, Jersey City; printers, Mr. Whalley, Washing-
ton, D.C. ; carpenters, John Reed, Jersey City; curriers,
N. H. Crane, Newark; machinists and blacksmiths, Mr.
Emmons, Washington, and A. J. Morris, New York;
plumbers, M. Stephens, New York; dry goods clerks,
J. H. Foy, New York, and Wm. Evans, carpenter,
Waterbury, Conn.
The representatives were all from New York and
New Jersey, with the exception of two from Washington
and one from Connecticut. They passed resolutions that
a National Convention be held in Baltimore, Md., on
the twentieth of August, 1866, and requesting the differ-
ent Unions to respond by sending delegates - recom-
mending that each local organization be allowed one
representative, and each Trades' Assembly two.
A committee, consisting of Messrs. Harding and Foy
of New York and Reed of Jersey City, were appointed
to act in conjunction with the Baltimore Trades' Assem-
bly in carrying out the plan for calling the convention.
It was voted to tax the unions represented in the con-
ference to pay for the advertising necessary to assemble
the convention. It was also voted that the consideration
of the eight-hour question should be the principal busi-
NATIONAL LABOR UNION 127
ness of the convention, but other business should also
receive due consideration. . .
(b) PROCEEDINGS
(x) Delegates and Officers.
Workingman's Advocate, Sept. i, 1866, pp. i, 4.
Andrew Schroeder, Ship Carpenters' and Caulkers'
Protective Union, St. Louis, Mo.; Thomas M. Dolan,
Henry George, Wm. H. Stewart, Grand Eight Hour
League, Detroit, Mich.; John Hinchcliffe, Railroad
Men's Protective Union, Painters' Union, and Ma-
chinery Moulders' Union of St. Louis, and Miners'
Lodge of Illinois; James Ashworth, Workingmen's
Union of St. Louis; Isaac Cline, Window Glassblowers'
Union, Birmingham, Pa.; D. D. Bolsom [Bolson, Bal-
som, Balson, Balston?], Mechanics' Association, Nor-
folk, Va. ; Thomas S. Denham; Housepainters' Union,
Washington, D.C. ; J. D. Pheall, Masons' Union, New-
burgh, N.Y. ; Alfred W. Phelps, Trades' Union, New
Haven, Conn.; C. W. Gibson, Eight Hour Association,
New Haven, Conn.; W. Harding, Coachmakers' Inter-
national Union, Brooklyn, N.Y. ; J. D. Ware, Coach-
makers' International Union, Philadelphia, Pa. ; T. E.
Hughes, Marble Cutters' Association, Boston, Mass.;
Jacob J. Alfred, Trades' Assembly, New Albany, Ind. ;
Wm. B. lies, Iron Moulders' Union, Augusta and Savan-
nah, Ga. ; A. C. Cameron, Trades' Assembly, Chicago,
and Grand Eight Hour League of 111.; R. L. Mastin
[Maston?], Trades' Assembly, Wilmington, Del. ; Rich-
ard Emmons, Workingmen's Convention, Washington,
D.C. ; M. J. Hannan, Bricklayers' Beneficial and Pro-
tective Union, Brooklyn, N.Y.; Jas. H. Reed, House
Carpenters' Trades' Union, Washington, D.C.; Wm.
C. C. Clark, Granite Cutters' Association, Washington,
D.C.; J. C. C. Whaley, Workingmen's Convention,
128 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Washington, D.C.; John Reid, Workingmen's Union,
New York City, N.Y. ; James J. Mitchell, Journeymen
Stonecutters' Association, Washington, D.C. ; John
Thomas, Blank-book Binders' Protective Union, New
York; Wm. J. Jessup, Shipjoiner's Union, New York,
N.Y. ; L. D. Cogswell, Carpenters', Joiners' and Ma-
chinists' Union, Lowell, Mass.; Alexander Troup,
Workingmen's Assembly, Boston, Mass.; John W.,
Cooper, Shipjoiners' Union, Baltimore; Oilman Bond
[sc. Rand], Bookbinders' Union, Boston; William P.
Blades, Blacksmiths' Union, Baltimore; J. R. Bolan,
Ship Carpenters' Union, Boston; George H. Spaulding,
Iron Moulders' Union, Boston; George W. Francis,
Bookbinders' Association, D.C.; Wm. H. Lee, Iron
Moulders' Association, Richmond, Va. ; E. Schlager, 18
German Workingmen's Association, Chicago, 111. J. J.
Doane, Workingmen's Union, New York City; Robert
B. Blake, Carpenters' and Joiners' Union, Philadelphia.
John H. Meeter, Eight Hour League, Iowa; Marshall
Roberts, Trades' Assembly, Philadelphia.
BALTIMORE DELEGATES -Hugh Potter, Journeymen
Coopers' Union; E. F. Flaherty, Journeymen Ship-
wrights' Union; Wm. Neadhamer, House Painters'
Union; Thomas Barnett, House and Ship Painters No.
2; Isaiah Brown, Wood Turners' Union; James B.
Overton and James Hyland, Trades' Assembly; Thomas
S. Everett, Harness Makers' Union; A. P. Judge, Pat-
tern Makers' Union; Charles E. Wilson, Canmakers'
Union; J. Edward Kirby, Bricklayers' Union; J. W.
Storey, Iron Moulders' Union; Thomas B. Griffin, Op-
erative Masons' Benevolent Union; James A. Mifflin,
18 Variously given as Schleger, Schlaeger, Schlager. F. A. Sorge, in "Die
Arbeiterbewegung in den Vereinigten Staaten," gives the name as Schlegel.
See Neue Zeit (Stuttgart, 1890-1891) vol. n, 443. -Eos.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 129
Machinists' Union; James Hyland, Trades' Assembly;
Philip Auld, Shipwrights' Union; John W. Cooper,
House Carpenters' Union; G. W. Maynard, Mill-
wrights' Union; Thomas B. Brian, Curriers' Associa-
tion; P. W. Ford, National Union of Curriers; Wm. G.
Miller, Shipjoiners' Association. . .
[Permanent Officers:] president, John Hinchcliffe,
of Illinois; vice president at large, J. C. C. Whaley, of
Washington, D.C. ; vice presidents, W. Gather, of Mary-
land; R. Emmons, of Washington, D.C.; John Reed, of
New York; A. W. Phelps of Connecticut; Wm. B. lies,
of Georgia; R. L. Mastin, of Delaware; W. H. Lee, of
Virginia; A. H. Troup, of Massachusetts; A. C. Cam-
eron, of Illinois; J. M. Dolan, of Michigan; A. Schroe-
der, of Missouri; Marshall Roberts, of Pennsylvania;
J. Alfred, of Indiana; J. H. Meeter, of Iowa. Secre-
taries, C. W. Gibson, of Connecticut, J. B. Overton, of
Maryland, and J. D. Ware, of Pennsylvania. . .
[Officers elected for ensuing year : President, J. C. C.
Whaley ; vice-president at large, E. Schlager ; vice-pres-
idents from different states represented, Massachusetts,
Alexander Troup; Maryland, William Gather; Penn-
sylvania, Marshall Roberts ; District of Columbia, Rich-
ard Emmons; Delaware, R. L. Mastin; New York, W.
J. Jessup ; Indiana, Jacob J. Alfred ; Michigan, Thomas
M. Dolan; Missouri, James Ashworth; Illinois, A. C.
Cameron; Iowa, James McKim; Georgia, William B.
lies; Virginia, D. B. Balsom; Connecticut, A. W.
Phelps; recording secretary, James B. Overton, Balti-
more; assistant recording secretary, William H. Lee,
Richmond, Virginia; corresponding secretary, C. W.
Gibson, New Haven, Connecticut; assistant correspond-
ing secretary, Henry George, Detroit, Michigan; finan-
cial committee, Thomas S. Everett, Baltimore; James
1 3 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Ashworth, Missouri; William Baldwin, New York
City.]
(2) Reports of Committees, and Resolutions.
Mr. A. C. Cameron, of Illinois, chairman of the com-
mittee on trades' unions and strikes, presented the fol-
lowing report:
Your committee on Trades' Unions and Strikes rec-
ognizing as a fundamental truth that in "union there is
strength," and believing also that all reforms in the
labor movement can only be effected by .an intelligent,
systematic effort of the industrial classes, and believing
also that that effort can at present best be directed
through the trades' organizations, your committee
would recommend the formation of unions in all local-
ities where the same do not now exist, and the formation
of an international organization in every branch of in-
dustry as a first and most important duty of the hour,
and claim that no man has performed his duty, either
to himself, his family, or his fellow-workmen, who has
heretofore neglected or refused to do so.
Believing also that, the efforts of the convention
should be directed to devise the most available and prac-
ticable means by which this united action may be ob-
tained, and knowing that a large number of our skilful
mechanics are excluded from these organizations by
past delinquencies, which it would be judicious to over-
look, we would recommend that an invitation be ex-
tended to all such to enroll themselves in the grand
army of labor, and that all local unions be urgently re-
quested to extend the olive branch of peace, and receive
such applicants in the spirit of conciliation and fraternal
regard; that the first of January, 1867, be named as the
time when such opportunity shall expire by limitation.
Your committee would also suggest that a more rigid
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 131
enforcement of the apprenticeship system should be en-
forced, believing that such action would redound to our
interests, as our trades' unions are, or should be, organ-
ized upon the principle of rendering a quid pro quo, an
equivalent for value received ; and so long as botches are
recognized as competent workmen, this principle is
virtually ignored.
They would also suggest that as there are a great many
laborers who do not form a part of trades 7 unions, and
as it is desirable to bring all within the ranks of the labor
movement, that a general workingmen's association be
recognized as belonging to the general organization, and
its delegates entitled to seats in any future labor con-
gress.
Your committee would also recommend the establish-
ment of mechanics' institutes,- lyceums and reading
rooms wherever practicable, and that institutes be erect-
ed on ground owned by the several labor associations.
With regard to the subject of strikes, your committee
give it as their deliberate opinion that they have been
productive of great injury to the laboring classes; that
many have been injudicious and ill-advised, and the re-
sult of impulse rather than principle; that those who
have been the fiercest in their advocacy have been the
first to advocate submission, and would therefore dis-
countenance them except as a dernier resort, and when
all means for an amicable and honorable adjustment
have been exhausted. Your committee would also rec-
ommend the appointment by each trades' assembly of an
Arbitration Committee, to whom shall be referred all
matters of dispute arising between employees and em-
ployers, believing that the earlier adoption of such a
system would have prevented a majority of these ill-ad-
vised so-called "strikes."
I 3 2 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
In conclusion, your committee would again refer to
the all important question of organization as a panacea
for this growing evil, because when every mechanic was
enrolled as a member of trades' unions, strikes would be-
come impossibilities.
Neither can this be taken as a menace to employers,
knowing as we do that the principle involved is not ag-
gressive but defensive in character, founded on the prin-
ciples of actual truth and justice. On the contrary they
believe it would be the means of creating a bond of sym-
pathy between employee and employer, inaugurating a
reign of confidence and mutual esteem, in place of the
antagonism and jealousy at present existing. [Adopted.]
[Committee on Co-operative Associations and Prison
Labor, Troup, Phelps, Storey, Reed, and Rand:]
RESOLVED, that the delegates to the National Labor
Congress on their return to their different constituencies,
recommend that petitions be circulated and forwarded
to the different legislatures urging upon them a passage
of co-operative acts.
RESOLVED, that having considered the matter of con-
vict labor at some length, your committee are of opinion
that if convict labor cannot be entirely abolished, that
the same compensation should be demanded by the
United States and respective states of contractors, con-
tracting for convict labor, as that paid in workshops
outside of the prisons; and your committee would re-
spectfully recommend that the workingmen petition
congress and their respective legislatures on this sub-
ject. [Adopted.]
[By Committee on Permanent National Organiza-
tion, Blake, Clarke, Gibson, lies, Mastin, Lee, Reed,
Schlager, George, Ashworth, Jessup, Cline, Alfred,
McCauley:]
RESOLVED, that this congress organize a permanent
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 133
National Labor Union, by selecting the following named
officers : a president, one vice president at large, and one
vice president from each state, territory and district rep-
resented in this congress, the said vice presidents to act
as corresponding secretaries for the labor organizations
in their respective state; one recording secretary, and
one assistant recording secretary, one corresponding sec-
retary, one assistant corresponding secretary, a treasurer,
and a finance committee of three. The president shall
be authorized to appoint a vice president from the states
that are not represented in this congress, as soon as he
may find some proper person so to appoint.
RESOLVED, that every Trades' Union, Workingmen's
Association, and Eight Hour League, shall be entitled
to one delegate in this congress for the first five hundred
members, or less, and every additional five hundred, or
fractional part thereof, one additional delegate; and
every National or International Union shall be repre-
sented by one delegate. It shall be the duty of the said
delegates of this organization to carry out the acts of the
present Labor Congress; to direct agitation and further
the interests of the labor movement by all possible
means.
The sessions of the Labor Congress shall be annual,
and shall be held alternately, in the different sections of
the Union, on the third Monday in August. The presi-
dent, recording secretary, corresponding secretary, vice
president at large, and treasurer, shall meet from time
to time for the transaction of business. The Executive
Board shall have power to levy a tax of twenty-five
cents a year upon each member belonging to the Na-
tional Labor Union.
[Southern Delegates] Mr. J. C. C. Whaley, of the
District of Columbia, offered the following:
WHEREAS, it is both desirable and proper that the
I 3 4 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
whole country should participate in the great labor
movement which this convention essays to inaugurate,
and whereas, the presence here of delegates from the
States of Georgia and Virginia, and the reception of
communications from the trades' assembly of Mobile
and New Orleans is a source of gratification and useful-
ness, offering an earnest of their desire and intention to
join with us in this attempt to ameliorate the condition
of the working classes, therefore
RESOLVED, that we hail with much pleasure the pres-
ence here of the delegation from the south, and cordially
and fraternally invite the people of that section of our
common country to join with us in the movement we have
undertaken, and to again renew the reciprocal relations
so unhappily suspended in the lamentable civil strife
through which we have recently passed. [Adopted.]
[By committee on "eight hours," and politics, Hyland,
Francis, Phelps, lies, Mastin, Bolson, Cogswell, Cam-
eron, Schlager, Hannan, Roberts, Alfred, McCauley,
Dolan:]
We, your committee appointed to bring before you
some plan for accomplishing the great object of this
Convention -the shortening of the hours of physical la-
bor-report the following preamble and resolutions:
WHEREAS, there comes from the ranks of labor a de-
mand for more time for moral, intellectual and social
culture, and believing that this demand is the result of
that condition of progress in which the workingmen of
this nation are prepared to take a step higher in the scale
of moral and intellectual life ; therefore
RESOLVED, that it be enjoined upon the members of this
congress, as they reach their respective homes, to use all
honorable means to agitate the "eight hour" question,
publicly and privately, and to effect some plan of organ-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 135
ization whereby we may secure the combined strength
of the workingmen of the nation to effect this great labor
reform, believing that all agitations and organizations
are the two great levers by which we are to accomplish
the great result; that so far as political action is con-
cerned, each locality should be governed by its own pol-
icy, whether to run an independent ticket of working-
men, or to use political parties already existing, but, at
all events, to cast no vote except for men pledged to the
interests of labor. . .
[A lengthy discussion followed on the political ques-
tion raised, in which the committee was supported by
Roberts, Hinchclifle, Phelps, and Schlager, the last fa-
voring an independent labor party, and opposed by
Hyland and Harding. The report was recommitted
In the afternoon the committee presented the following
amended report:]
WHEREAS, the history and legislation of the past has
demonstrated the fact that no confidence whatever can
be placed in the pledges or professions of the representa-
tives of existing political parties so far as the interests of
the industrial classes are concerned: therefore be it
RESOLVED, that the time has come when the working-
men of the United States should cut themselves aloof
from party ties and predilections, and organize them-
selves into a National Labor Party, the object of which
shall be, to secure the enactment of a law making "eight
hours" a legal day's work by the national Congress and
the several state legislatures, and the election of men
pledged to sustain and represent the interests of the in-
dustrial classes.
RESOLVED, that the most available means to secure the
desired results is by systematic agitation, and the estab-
lishment of eight hour leagues, by the labor community
136 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
and aid of the public press and public speakers, and this
convention recommends to the several delegates that
upon their return to their respective homes, they will
urge upon their fellow workmen the necessity of imme-
diate organization.
RESOLVED, that in order to carry out the aims and
objects of the above resolution, we recommend to every
friend of the movement to vote for no candidate not un-
equivocally pledged to vote for a law making "eight
hours" a legal day's work, and in favor of all measures
of labor reform.
RESOLVED, that where a workingman is found avail-
able for any office, the preference should invariably be
given to such a person.
[By the Committee on Resolutions, Gathers, Francis,
Phelps, Baldwin, lies, Mastin, Bolson, Troup, Cameron,
Stewart, Ashworth, Dalzell, Alfred, McCauley:]
WHEREAS, The growing and alarming encroachments
of capital upon the rights of the industrial classes of the
United States have rendered it imperative that they
should calmly and deliberately devise the most effective
and available means by which the same may be arrested,
your committee would recommend the adoption of the
following resolutions:
RESOLVED, that the first and grand desideratum of the
hour, in order to deliver the labor of the country from
this thraldom, is the adoption of a law whereby eight
hours shall constitute a legal day's work in every state of
the American union, and that they are determined never
to relax their efforts.
[On the fourth day the vote was reconsidered, and the
report recommitted "to meet the views of the delegates
opposing it." The committee recommended the addi-
tion of the following words to the first resolution ; and
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 137
the report, with this amendment, was adopted with one
negative vote.] "In view of this fact, we, the representa-
tives of the workingmen of America, in Congress as-
sembled, recommend that steps be taken to form the
same [a national labor party], and which shall be put in
operation as soon as possible."
[After a prolonged discussion the amended report was
adopted by the following vote:] Ayes -Messrs. Gib-
son and Phelps of Ct. ; Reed, Francis, Denham, Em-
mons, D.C.; lies of Ga. ; Alfred of Ind. ; Cameron,
Schlager and HinchclifTe of 111.; McCauley of Iowa;
Spalding, Troup, Bolan, Rand and Reed of Mass.;
Overton, Blades, Wilson, Griffin and Judge of Md. ;
Dolan, George and Stewart of Mich.; Schroeder and
Ashworth of Mo.; Hammond [Hannan?], Jessup,
Thomas, Reed, Harding, Map.es of N.Y.; J. D. Ware
and Armstrong of Pa. -making 35.
Nays -Messrs. Maston of Va. ; Clarke and Whaley,
Kirby, Gather, Cooper, Everett, Potter, Flaherty [Flar-
ery] and Sapp of Md. ; Balsom [ ?] of N.Y. ; Glass, Ver-
ner, Dalzell and Roberts of Pa. ; Balsom, Lee and Forth
of Va.- making 24. . .
RESOLVED, that it is the imperative duty of every work-
ingman in the United States to connect himself with his
labor organization, if any exists; and where none exists,
to immediately commence the formation of the same;
that it is the equal duty of every union to be represented
in a trades' or workingmen's assembly, and also to aid
in the formation of a national or international organiza-
tion where the same do not exist.
RESOLVED, that we heartily concur in the action of the
Committee on a National Organ, and would recommend
that the Workingman's Advocate, of Chicago; Daily
and Weekly Voice, of Boston; Daily. Union^of Detroit;
138 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Moulders' International Journal, Philadelphia; Her-
ald, of Troy, New York; Industrial Advocate, of St.
Louis; German Reform, of Chicago, and all other pa-
pers favorable to the labor movement, receive the sup-
port and patronage of the workingmen in those localities
in preference to all others.
RESOLVED, that in co-operation we recognize a sure
and lasting remedy for the abuses of the present indus-
trial system, and hail with delight the organization of
co-operative stores and workshops in this country, and
would urge their formation in every section of the coun-
try and in every branch of business.
RESOLVED, that the system of prison labor which is
practiced throughout this country is not only injurious
to the producing classes, but it is an invitation for mean
employers to contract with the government for cheap
labor, and the honorable mechanics not being able to
compete with this class of labor and support their fami-
lies, are obliged to seek a living elsewhere much to their
inconvenience, and we would recommend that the public
be requested not to patronize parties who contract for
prison labor, except they pay the rate of wages demanded
by mechanics outside.
RESOLVED, that we pledge our individual and undi-
vided support to the sewing-women and daughters of toil
in this land, and would solicit their hearty co-operation,
knowing, as we do, that no class of industry is so much
in need of having their condition ameliorated as the fac-
tory operatives, sewing-women, etc., of this country.
RESOLVED, as the sense of this congress, that the speedy
restoration of the agricultural interests of the Southern
States is of vital importance to the laboring men of the
North, and that the aggregation and capitalizing of the
surplus earnings of labor for the two fold purpose of
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 139
promoting an increased production of cotton, and of aid-
ing and elevating the laboring classes, as proposed by the
American Industrial Agency, is very desirable, and we
invite the attention of the laboring men to the subject.
RESOLVED, that we would urgently call the attention of
the industrial classes to the subject of tenement houses
and improved dwellings, believing it essential to the wel-
fare of the whole community that a reform should be
effected in this respect, as the experience of the past has
proven that vice, pauperism and crime are the invariable
attendants of the over-crowded, illy-ventilated dwellings
of the poor, and urge upon the capitalists of the country
the blessings to be derived from investing their means
in erecting such dwellings.
RESOLVED, that we this day join hands with labor in
the interests of agriculture, and hereby declare it pri-
mary in our different organizations, and all that are now
or hereafter organized shall adopt the same in the fol-
lowing words: "That the whole public domain shall
be disposed of to actual settlers only;" and that the
proper officers of this convention are instructed to see
that the foregoing resolutions shall be carried into effect.
RESOLVED, that the public domain belongs to the peo-
ple of the whole states, purchased by their blood and
treasure, and is to them an inheritance, endorsing fully
as we do the opinion of our best statesmen on the subject
that a minimum price be fixed for the whole agricul-
tural domain, to be disposed of to actual settlers only.
Further, if Congress or the several states, where lands
may exist, as belonging to the nation or states, that they
shall not be so considered, but shall be considered as
belonging to the people, and in cases where the legisla-
tors may wish to encourage any public works with such
as railroads, bridges, roads, agricultural colleges, etc.,
1 4 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
for the several states, or any other improvements that
may be thought proper from time to time, then in all
cases of this kind it shall be considered unjust and de-
structive to the best interests of the people to make spe-
cial grants of these lands, but only the proceeds thereof. 19
RESOLVED, that this congress deprecate what is famil-
iarly known as "strikes" among workingmen, and would
recommend that every other honorable means be ex-
hausted before such a course is resorted to. [Struck out
in 1 868. -EDS.]
RESOLVED, that the formation of mechanics' institutes,
lyceums, reading rooms, and the erection of buildings
for the purpose is recommended to the workingmen in
all cities and towns as a means of advancing their intel-
lectual culture and social improvement.
RESOLVED, that this Labor Congress would most re-
spectfully recommend to the workingmen of the coun-
try that in case they are pressed by a want of employment
they proceed to the public lands and become actual
settlers, believing that if the industry of the country
can be coupled with its natural advantages, it will re-
dound both in individual relief and national advantage.
The report was received and adopted. . . The
Congress adjourned with prayer by Mr. Emmons.
[The convention appointed a committee which called
upon President Andrew Johnson and presented the sub-
jects of hours of labor, public lands, protection against
importation of foreign pauper labor, and convict labor.
The president replied that he had "said something on
all the propositions" and had himself "started most of
them." The members of the committee were: John
Hinchcliffe, of Missouri, chairman; J. W. Cooper, of
Maryland; A. C. Cameron, Illinois; Robert Emmons,
19 The report of the Committee on Public Lands is quoted entire in the "Ad-
dress to Workingmen" which follows these "Proceedings."- EDS.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 141
District of Columbia; Alexander Troup of Connecti-
cut; L. R. Mastin of Delaware; W. Lee of Virginia;
J. H. Spaulding of Massachusetts; W. Harding of New
York; James Ashworth of Georgia [Missouri?] ; W. H.
Stewart of Michigan; Andrew Schroeder of Missouri;
A. Dalzell of Pennsylvania; J. Alfred of Indiana; and
W. S. Macauley of lowa.-Workingman's Advocate,
Sept. i, 1866.]
(c) ADDRESS TO WORKINGMEN
The Address of the National Labor Congress to the fVorkingmen of the
United States , leaflet, Hazlitt and Quinton, Printers (Chicago,
1867). The committee on address was appointed at the Baltimore
congress, but the address was not published until almost a year later.
The chairman of the committee, and author of the address, Andrew
C. Cameron, was editor of the Chicago JVorkingman's Advocate.
FELLOW CITIZENS: On the twentieth of August,
1866, the first National Labor Congress ever convened
in the United States, was ushered into existence in the
city of Baltimore, Md., when sixty delegates represent-
ing a majority of the States of the Union, met for the
purpose of effecting a permanent, systematic organiza-
tion of the wealth producing classes, and devising the
best means by which their interests could be subserved
and protected. Heretofore the highest form that labor
associations had taken was the national union of some
of the respective trades. Between these organizations,
however, there was no sympathy or systematic connec-
tion; no co-operative effort; no working for the attain-
ment of a common end, the want of which has been ex-
perienced for years by every craft and calling. As a
matter of course the work there accomplished was of a
preliminary character. While all present realized the
importance and necessity of the undertaking, the mag-
nitude and multiplicity of the interests involved were
of such a nature, and the time for deliberation so lim-
1 42 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
ited, that little more could be effected than the adoption
of a declaration of principles and the framing of a
groundwork for future action. The number of the sub-
jects handled by the congress, and the enlightened judg-
ment and moderation displayed in their discussion, even
under these circumstances, was such as to elicit the com-
mendation of all friends of the cause, which is certainly
an augury of hope for the future.
At that convention the undersigned were appointed
a committee to prepare, on behalf of the congress, an
address to the workingmen of America, setting forth the
objects sought to be attained, soliciting their co-opera-
tion in the premises, and their attendance at its next ses-
sion, to be holden at Chicago, Illinois, on the nineteenth
of August, 1867.
In the fulfillment of that task the first question which
presents itself is the all-absorbing subject of Eight
Hours.
The question of all others, which at present engrosses
the attention of the American workman, and, in fact, the
American people - is the proposed reduction of the hours
of daily labor, and the substitution of the eight for the
ten hour system, now recognized as the standard of
a legal day's work. As might have been expected, the
employing capitalists, aided by a venal press, have set
up a howl of rage, and protested against the adoption
of such a monstrous innovation, though it is worthy of
note that the chief opposition comes from those who
confessedly have given the subject the least considera-
tion.
The committee do not intend, in this address, to enter
into any lengthened defence of the measure, but prefer
to present its claims, justice and necessity, upon a few
simple truths, which must commend themselves to the
JOHN SINEY
Miner. First president of Miners'
National Association, 1873
O. H. KELLEY
Farmer. Founder of Patrons of
Husbandry, 1873
ANDREW C. CAMERON
Printer. Editor of Chicago Work-
ingman's Advocate, 1864-1877. He
attended every annual Industrial
Congress, 1866-1875. In 1869, he
went as delegate to Basle Congress
of International Workingmen's As-
sociation, from the National Labor
Union, of which he became treasurer
in 1871
EDWARD H. ROGERS
Ship-carpenter. Member of Massa-
chusetts Legislature and of famous
Eight-hour Commission, 1865
NATIONAL LABOR UNION 145
judgment of the public at large. In all the discussions
by the partisan press -from the metropolitan journal to
the village croaker -every moral consideration has been
waived, every plea put forth by its advocates omitted,
and every argument adduced has been based on a purely
selfish, dollars and cents standpoint.
On the contrary, the producing classes assert that other
and higher considerations than those heretofore ad-
vanced by its opponents should enter into the discussion
of its merits or practicability. They insist it is a self-
evident proposition that the success of our republican
institutions must depend on the virtue, the intelligence
and the independence of the working classes ; and that
any system, social or political, which tends to keep the
masses in ignorance, whether by unjust or oppressive
laws, or by over-manual labor, is injurious alike to the
interests of the state and the individual. But while
standing on this principle they claim that even from a
financial stand-point the benefits its adoption would
confer, can be demonstrated beyond a peradventure.
They realize that the present is emphatically an age of
progress ; that day by day the genius of man - the toiler-
is developing some system, some theory, some invention
to lessen human labor and increase the already enormous
accumulations of capital. They find, also, that the ex-
amination of the records both of our own and the British
Patent Office, divulges the fact that three-fourths of the
labor saving machinery, perfected during the past twen-
ty-five years, has been the creation of the workingman's
own brain; further, that since the adoption of the ten
hour system, these inventions have increased over seven-
ty-five per cent, while their position remains virtually
the same, proving conclusively that capital has reaped
the advantages obtained by such discoveries.- In view
146 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
of these truths they ask that the wealth-producer should
share, if not equally, at least partially, the benefits de-
rived -a demand, the justice of which, we think, few
will have the temerity to deny.
But there is still another phase of the question which
entitles it to serious consideration. While the invention
and application of labor-saving machinery has, in all
cases, redounded to the interests of the employer, its op-
eration has been, in many instances, injurious both to
the physical and intellectual welfare of the workman;
his duties frequently partaking of an automatic charac-
ter, while it denies all opportunity for the healthy exer-
cise of the mind. A workman who planned, gauged
and constructed, employed his intellectual as well as his
physical energies, while the man who merely performs
the monotonous functions of a mere automaton, as thou-
sands of our factory employees do from year to year, must
eventually descend both in the intellectual and social
scale.
It is certainly strange that even its most ardent friends,
outside the labor ranks, speak of its success as problemat-
ical, ignoring the fact that in countries less favored than
our own, where it has obtained a full and impartial trial,
its staunchest advocates are the employers themselves ; in
a country too which is represented with credit in its legis-
lative halls by men who earn their living by the sweat of
their brows.
The plea urged that the laboring classes would not
use the leisure time obtained to their own, and conse-
quently, to the benefit of the community, is one which
is disproved by the experience of the past. Every sim-
ilar reformation, although ushered in with equally omi-
nous prediction, has not only tended to the development
of the resources and material prosperity of the country
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 147
inaugurating it, but has been the means of improving
the physical and intellectual condition of the laboring
classes; and there is certainly no reason for supposing
that the adoption of the eight hour system would not have
an equally beneficial result. The truth is, that the wish
is father to the thought, and it is because they know to the
contrary, that these reckless assertions are indulged in.
The charge that workingmen, as a class, are ignorant
and illiterate, instead of being an argument against, is
one of the strongest reasons which could be urged in
favor of its adoption. They are ignorant because they
are over-worked; because they have been denied the
privileges which others, more favored, have reaped.
They have realized, by practical experience, that the
relation between the physical and intellectual energies is
such, that injury to one means injury to both; and that
the ignorance complained of is the result of that system
that they are now determined to destroy. That so long
as it exists, so long will they occupy their present menial
position; to occupy another or more exalted one they
must think more and work less; devote more time to
their own advancement, and less to the enrichment of
the drones of society.
These truths, and a thousand others equally applica-
ble, might be cited, but we forbear. What is needed is
the co-operation of the workingmen of America to bring
into operation this much desired reform. While some
states have nobly led the van others have stood idly by.
Of its ultimate triumph we cannot, dare not entertain a
doubt. The repulse of the skirmish line should only
nerve to more determined action, and show the necessity
of united effort. There is certainly no cause for de-
spondency. The future is big with hope. From all
quarters come words of encouragement and cheer. We
148 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
believe, if a proper energy is manifested at the next ses-
sion of our National Legislature, an Eight Hour Law
will be passed by an almost unanimous vote, which will
doubtless impart the needed energy to those who have
heretofore neglected their duty. All that is wanted, fel-
low citizens, then, is faith in the right, harmony, unity
and resolve, and eight hours will shortly become, by legal
enactment, a day's work in every state in the American
Union. This question naturally leads us to the consid-
eration of a subject which is intimately associated with
its adoption, viz : Co-operation.
The question of co-operative stores and co-operative
associations for trading and manufacturing purposes has
the widest bearing and effect upon the condition of the
workingmen ; and although anything like a full discus-
sion of the principles of co-operative industry is beyond
the scope of an address of this character, the committee
feel it their duty not to pass the subject by without a brief
reference to its beneficial results. In England, where co-
operative stores were first introduced, they have proved
eminently successful, beyond even the hopes of their
originators, and their diffusion over the kingdom, and
their introduction into other countries are a sufficient
attestation of their benefits.
The twenty-eight flannel weavers who, within a quar-
ter of a century, in order to avoid the exactions of the
petty trades people -middle men -who grew rich with
the sale of commodities of villainous quality at exor-
bitant prices, combined, at Rochdale, to become their
own purveyors, laid the foundations of an enterprise
which has come, in the course of a few years, to flourish
in one of the principal towns of England, and which is
prolific of the grandest results to the workingmen.
To say that co-operative stores, co-operative mills,
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 149
etc., have been successful, is but feebly to express the
measure of their benefits. The Rochdale weavers start-
ed with a subscription of five or six cents a week from
each member, and when they had accumulated the sum
of one hundred and forty dollars, they began the sale of
a few groceries, which rapidly extended to the carrying
on of numerous trades, and, in less than ten years, their
capital reached the sum of Two Hundred and Fifty
Thousand Dollars. The advantages of this method are
not limited to the fact that the purchaser at such stores
gets his goods at a slight advance upon the original cost,
and participates in the profits of the enterprise, but the
adulterations of articles of food, which have become so
general, and which are so destructive of health, are
avoided.
The committee cannot too strongly urge upon the
workingmen of this country the advantage -almost ne-
cessity even -of establishing co-operative stores.
The example of Rochdale shows how easily they may
do so, and when extended to every manufacture and
trade, as they easily may, the workingmen will cease to
contribute to the support of those who do not of them-
selves contribute anything to the products of labor, but
who secure a large proportion of those products merely
in distributing them.
It has been well said that the whole atmosphere of
such a store is honest. There is no distrust, no decep-
tion, no adulteration and no second prices.
Men have an interest in cheating others, not them-
selves, and therefore when they furnish their own food,
or articles of clothing, there will be no false weight or
measure, no adulteration of quality or trick of trade to
be feared.
And there are special reasons and needs for the ex-
1 5 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
istence of co-operative efforts in this country, for here
there is less disposition on the part of capital to com-
bine and co-operate with labor, than elsewhere, in con-
sequence of the excessive accumulations of capital by
the great rates of interest which prevail in this country.
A false, vicious financial system endows capital with
powers of increase largely in excess of the development
of national wealth by natural productions.
Labor increases the wealth of the country yearly but
little in advance of three per cent, as the census statistics
amply attest. The national wealth as the product of the
national labor, augments at this rate; whereas capital
employed in banking and manufacturing enterprises,
in railroad bonds or invested in mortgages, accumulated
at a rate three or four times greater than the increase
in wealth by the production of labor. Hence the pro-
prietors of a house must receive by way of rent not only
the interest which the money expended in the purchase
of the lot and building of the house would yield, if in-
vested in bank stock, railroad bonds, federal securities,
or loaned out on mortgage, but also enough in addition
to maintain repairs and pay insurance and taxes.
Unless capital invested in houses will do this, its
owner has no object in employing it thus. Hence the
high rates which consume so much of the workingman's
wages. Hence he is obliged to live in poor houses in
the suburbs of our large cities, miles away from his
shop or place of work. And the same thing is true of
the manufacturer. His capital must yield him not only
this profitable rate of interest, but must also be enough
above them to pay for the wear and breakage of ma-
chinery and the risks of trade. And in order to secure
this excessive profit he demands the protection of gov-
ernment by the machinery of tariff laws.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 151
This extraordinary power of accumulation which the
laws give to money in this country, render everything
the workingman wears, and the rent of the house which
shelters his family, very high, and as this accumulative
power is many times in excess of the accumulation of
wealth by labor, the prices of clothing and the cost
of rent are largely out of proportion to the price oi
wages.
Let the workingman toil ever so hard and constantly,
let his habits be ever so economical -at the end of the
year he finds his inevitable expenses have consumed all
his wages.
He has no remedy against this but to combine his earn-
ings with his brothers in labor, and build his own house,
manufacture his own goods, and supply his and his fam-
ily's needs with his own provisions.
The natural co-operation is between capital and la-
bor, but the rapid increase of the former, through the
agency of interest laws and banking systems, makes
capital not only independent but oppressive of labor.
The earnings of the latter go to the former with the
directness and inevitableness of an inexorable law. And
until capital and labor become organized into a system
of mutual co-operation, the workingmen must protect
themselves by means of co-operation with one another.
But the advantages which they will derive from it will
make them to a much greater extent than now, masters
of their own time. It will secure to them the means of
study, which will enable them to comprehend the just
relations between capital and labor, and the power of
organizing these relations into law. We confidently
look forward to a period not remote when the co-opera-
tive principle will carry on the great works and im-
provements of the age. It will build all our cities, dig
1 5 2 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
our ores, fill the land with the noise of loom and spindle.
The workingman as he is now in many instances his own
purveyor through co-operative stores, will become con-
tractor, builder, manufacturer, reaping the rewards of
his own industry and the profits of his own labor.
TRADES' UNIONS. There are, probably, no organiza-
tions upon the nature of which so much real ignorance
exists, even among workingmen, or against which such
a persistent and systematic opposition has been urged,
as trades' unions. Their aims and objects have been
grossly misrepresented, and public prejudice has been
aroused by those who only know enough to pander to
popular ignorance. In spite of this opposition, how-
ever, they are daily increasing in numbers and influence,
and the committee trust that the day is not far distant
when every competent and honorable workman will be
embraced within their folds.
So far from encouraging the spirit of hostility to em-
ployers, all properly organized unions recognize an
identity of interest between and confer as many benefits
on the employer as the employed.
That their establishment has been beneficial to the
community in general and the working classes in par-
ticular, can best be demonstrated by reference to the
reforms inaugurated through their agency, and the so-
cial and intellectual status of those mechanics who re-
fuse to become connected with them. Just in proportion
as they have increased in influence have pauperism and
crime decreased, and the principles of co-operative in-
dustry proved successful. Trades' Unions have a tend-
ency to develop those principles of self respect, justice
and independence which are characteristic only of a
true manhood, and which must prove in the future, as
they have in the past, the grand educational schools from
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 153
which so many of our most worthy and influential me-
chanics have graduated.
Preposterous as the assertion may seem, we claim they
have been the creation of necessity, and that they are
purely defensive in character. They insist, and justly
so, that the employee shall have, at least, an equal voice
with the employer in determining the value of the labor
performed, and knowing that isolation is weakness and
combination strength, they prefer trusting to the power
and justice of their united claims, than in the magna-
nimity or generosity of capital.
It may seem inconsistent, but it is nevertheless true,
that those who decry their arbitrary exactions have no
conscientious scruples about receiving the standard of
wages adopted through their exertions. The truth of the
matter is, no mechanic who is not a moral coward, or an
incompetent workman, can give a satisfactory reason
why his name is not found on a union register.
We are well aware that a vindictive, arbitrary spirit -
a spirit at variance with the principles inculcated -may,
too often, be found in many of our local societies, but
we cannot recognize the validity of this argument for
non-membership, as in too many instances we have rea-
son to believe it is used as a mere subterfuge to escape
that responsibility which rests on the head of every one
who refuses or neglects to comply with his imperative
duty.
A too common error, and one into which even work-
ingmen are prone to fall, is the charge that they demand
the same wages for an inferior as a superior workman.
This is far from being the case. While it is true they
establish a minimum rate of wages, they do not prevent,
in any instance, a superior workman from receiving such
extra compensation, over and above that schedule, as
I 5 4 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
his services may entitle him to. The high standard of
moral worth demanded by our labor organizations of
their members also entitle them to public favor. Many,
who a few years ago were among the most thriftless and
dissolute of men, upon whom reason and entreaty were
alike thrown away, are to-day, through their influence,
the peers in intelligence, faithfulness and sobriety of any
body of mechanics in the country. The committee there-
fore feel it to be their duty to urge upon every non-union
man the necessity of at once allying himself with a
trades' association. Infringing on the religious or polit-
ical sentiments of no one ; guarding alike the interests of
employer and employee, guaranteeing a quid pro quo., in
all cases where their workings are unobstructed, they fur-
nish most effective barriers against the aggressions of
capital, without which all would be strife, anarchy and
confusion.
THE APPRENTICE SYSTEM. In direct connection with
the foregoing subject, and one that demands immediate
reformation, is our present defective apprenticeship sys-
tem. While it is true, employers, as a class, have them-
selves in great measure to blame for the existing evils,
we fear our trades' unions do not exercise due diligence
in requiring from applicants for membership the evi-
dence that they are qualified to fill the position to which
they aspire. On the one hand we have the complaint
that all members of trades' organizations have not served
a legitimate apprenticeship; on the other the unanswer-
able charge that in every case of difficulty, employers
have been the first to violate the contract, by securing
the services of botches to thwart the claims of competent
workmen; that as self-preservation is nature's first law,
these men are admitted simply in self-defence ; and that
whenever employers agree to a more honorable war-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 155
fare -if warfare there must be -the trades' unions will
cordially co-operate with them in the rigid enforcement
of an apprenticeship law.
It certainly requires no argument to prove that it is
alike the interest and duty of every competent mechanic
to insist that his associates should present their diploma
before allowing their labor to enter into competition
with his own. A man who has served a faithful ap-
prenticeship, and whose capital consists in a knowledge
of his calling, ought certainly to be the last person to
abandon a system, the application of which is essential
to his welfare. If law or custom demanded he should
serve for a given time in a subordinate capacity, it could
only be with the tacit understanding that he should reap
the fruits of his labor at its expiration, and that the priv-
ileges honorably won by such compliance would be scru-
pulously regarded by all employers.
How long the suicidal policy at present pursued will
be continued, must be determined by those directly in-
terested. We think, however, it is the imperative duty
of all Trades' Unions to use their influence to secure its
recognition and enforcement both by the employer and
employee, and thus practically illustrate that member-
ship in their bodies, guarantees an efficient and qualified
workman.
STRIKES. With regard to the question of strikes, the
committee feel they cannot too strongly deprecate all
appeals to such extreme measures, except as a dernier
resort, believing that by the appointment, where prac-
ticable, of a conference committee, whose duty it would
be to lay the nature of the grievance before the employer,
and ask redress for the same, many, if not all, of the
difficulties complained of could be satisfactorily re-
moved. "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of
156 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
cure," and as a large majority of the strikes end in fail-
ure and disaster, our unions have everything to gain and
nothing to lose by the adoption of such a course. Nor is
this view the only one to be taken ; failure, in many in-
stances, exposes weaknesses which render them more
liable than heretofore to fresh encroachments. These
remarks, however, are intended only for general appli-
cations ; there are emergencies when no other alternative
but a strike is presented. On such occasions the duty of
all honorable workmen is plain and unmistakable, and
that is, to make common cause, to unite as one man, to
act in concert, a course which if adopted and adhered to,
would bring about very different results to those which
generally attend such demonstrations.
FEMALE LABOR. We are glad to learn that this sub-
ject is engrossing, to a great degree, the attention of all
true reformers, and have every reason to believe that its
thorough and careful examination will go a long way to
remove the causeless prejudices heretofore entertained
by all classes against its employment in many channels
of useful occupations. The position of the laboring
classes, however, as a body, on this question, as on many
others, has been grossly misrepresented. They have ob-
jected, and naturally, too, to the introduction of female
labor when used as a means to depreciate the value of
their own, and accomplish the selfish ends of an em-
ployer, when under the specious plea of disinterested
"philanthropy," the ulterior object has not been the
elevation of woman, but the degradation of man, or as
has been the case in almost every instance, where the
labor of one has been brought into competition with the
other. We claim that if they are capable to fill the posi-
tions now occupied by the stronger sex -and in many
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 157
instances they are eminently qualified to do so -they are
entitled to be treated as their equals, and receive the
same compensation for such services. That they do not
is prima facie evidence that their employment is entire-
ly a question of self-interest, from which all other con-
siderations are excluded. Why should the seamstress or
female factory operative receive one-third or one-half
the amount demanded by and paid to men for the per-
formance of the same work? Yet that such is the case,
is a fact too well established to require corroboration.
We trust, therefore, that the workingmen of America
will protest against the further continuance of this in-
iquitous system, and lend their powerful influence to
effect a reform, and in no manner can they do so more
thoroughly than by aiding in the formation of those
labor associations in which experience has demonstrated
their own safety lies. We now pass to the considerations
of a question in the successful solution of which the
working classes have an abiding interest -the question
of negro labor.
The condition of the negro as a slave, and the moral
and economical effects of slavery, were discussed by
the press, from the public rostrum, and in the halls of
Congress for years and years with great energy and zeal ;
what shall be his status as a free man is at present a mat-
ter of no less national anxiety. But aside from this, his
interest as a workingman, and especially the part he is
to take in advancing the cause of labor have, as yet, re-
ceived no consideration. It is in this last respect ex-
clusively that, the question has an interest for the friends
of the labor reform; an interest of such vital importance
that, delicate as the question may be, and notwithstand-
ing the impossibility of expressing an opinion in refer-
1 5 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
ence to it, which would meet with the universal approval
of the workingmen of America, the committee feel that
it would be a sad dereliction to pass it by unnoticed.
The first thing to be accomplished before we can hope
for any great results is the thorough organization of all
the departments of labor. This work, although its be-
ginning is of such recent date, has progressed with
amazing rapidity. Leagues, societies and associations
exist in all the large towns and cities, and in many vil-
lages and country districts. There are central organiza-
tions in many of the states, and one national labor con-
gress, the result of whose deliberation on the future wel-
fare of the country can scarcely be overestimated. In
this connection we cannot overlook the important posi-
tion now assigned to the colored race in this contest.
Unpalatable as the truth may be to many, it is needless
to disguise the fact that they are destined to occupy a
different position in the future, to what they have in
the past; that they must necessarily become in their new
relationship an element of strength or an element of
weakness, and it is for the workingmen of America to
say which that shall be.
The systematic organization and consolidation of la-
bor must henceforth become the watchword of the true
reformer. To accomplish this the co-operation of the
African race in America must be secured. If those
most directly interested fail to perform this duty, others
will avail themselves of it to their injury. Indeed a
practical illustration of this was afforded in the recent
importation of colored caulkers from Portsmouth, Va.,
to Boston, Mass., during the struggle on the eight hour
question. What is wanted then, is for every union to
help inculcate the grand, ennobling idea that the inter-
ests of labor are one ; that there should be no distinction
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 159
of race or nationality; no classification of Jew or Gen-
tile, Christian or Infidel; that there is but one dividing
line -that which separates mankind into two great
classes, the class that labors and the class that lives by
others' labors. This, in our judgment, is the true course
for us as workingmen. The interest of all on our side
of the line is the same, and should we be so far misled
by prejudice or passion as to refuse to aid the spread of
union principles among any of our fellow toilers, we
would be untrue to them, untrue to ourselves and to the
great cause we profess to have at heart. If these gen-
eral principles be correct, we must seek the co-opera-
tion of the African race in America.
But aside from all this, the workingmen of the United
States have a special interest in seeking their co-opera-
tion. This race is being rapidly educated, and will soon
be admitted to all the privileges and franchises of
citizenship. That it will neither die out nor be exter-
minated, is now regarded as a settled fact. They are
there to live amongst us, and the question to be decided
is, shall we make them our friends, or shall capital be
allowed to turn them as an engine against us? They
number four millions strong, and a greater proportion
of them labor with their hands than can be counted
from among the same number of any other people on
earth. Their moral influence, and their strength at the
ballot-box would be of incalculable value to the cause
of labor. Can we afford to reject their proffered co-
operation and make them enemies? By committing
such an act of folly we would inflict greater injury upon
the cause of Labor Reform than the combined efforts
of capital could accomplish. Their cherished idea of
an antagonism between white and black labor, would be
realized, .and as the Austrian despotism makes use of
i6o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
the hostility between the different races, which com-
pose the empire to maintain her existence and her bal-
ance, so capitalists, north and south, would foment dis-
cord between the whites and blacks, and hurl the one
against the other, as interest and occasion might require,
to maintain their ascendancy and continue the reign
of oppression. Lamentable spectacle! Labor warring
against labor, and capital smiling and reaping the fruits
of this mad contest.
Taking this view of the question, we are of the opin-
ion that the interests of the labor cause demand that all
workingmen be included within its ranks, without re-
gard to race or nationality; and that the interests of the
workingmen of America especially requires that the
formation of trades' unions, eight hour leagues, and
other labor organizations, should be encouraged among
the colored race; that they be instructed in the true
principles of labor reform, and that they be invited to
co-operate with us in the general labor undertaking.
The time when such co-operation should take effect we
leave to the decision and wisdom of the next congress,
believing that such enlightened action will be there de-
veloped as to redound to the best and most lasting inter-
ests of all concerned.
THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. The reckless manner in which
the public lands have been wantonly squandered and
voted to corporations, demands the immediate attention
of the American public. The recent expose, by John
Bright, of the villainous system - a system, too, which we
as a nation are fast adopting- which has placed one-half
of the landed property in Great Britain in the possession
of a score of so-called landlords, is one from which we
should take timely warning. The report of the Balti-
more committee, which reported last year on the same,
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 161
is so terse and appropriate, that we cannot do better than
transfer it entire. It reads as follows:
The cause of complaint is the monopoly of the new or
government lands, using the legislation of the country
as the medium by which this monopoly is created. We
find something of three hundred million of acres of these
lands, a large amount being excluded from taxation,
and have been for a series of years. That the subject of
agriculture we accept as one of great importance. Con-
sidered as the basis of all wealth, at least, we cannot
subsist without this all important industry. It would
seem superficial for any at this day and condition of
civilization to accumulate evidence to prove the im-
portance of this industrial pursuit; that cheap living
necessitates a larger area of labor, not only in the in-
creased consumption of manufacturing products, but as
a defence against foreign importation of these articles.
Much of the protection that is now urged by the man-
ufacturer as necessary to protect him is occasioned by
the high price of living, and your committee would here
state that they consider it a very essential step towards
correcting the evil complained of, when this congress
shall resolve that this government shall no longer be the
medium by which land monopoly shall be established in
our new states and territories. To attempt to enlarge
our commerce and manufactures by neglecting so im-
portant a principle of political economy, would be like
substituting the apex for the base of the pyramid. The
prayer of the petitioners should be granted, particularly
at this time, as we think it will have a wholesome in-
fluence in checking legislation in a wrong direction.
The early founders of the government considered it un-
just and unconstitutional to deal in class legislation with
respect to the public domain. Madison wrote against
1 62 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
it; President Monroe, in the language of Thomas H.
Benton, in his Thirty Years' Review, says, "that he
had exhausted all argument in the language to prove
that this power did not exist, and for a correct under-
standing of this subject nothing further may be said."
General Jackson refused to sign bills for making special
grants of land, and bringing to his support and position
the favor and sympathies of a large party. His position
was that it was bad economy, unjust to the pioneer agri-
culturist, and destructive to the material interests of the
country; that the lands in the hands of a few capitalists
would be likely to make the necessity of the settler their
opportunity. He therefore recommended, in his mes-
sage to congress, just what your petitioners would ask
of this congress, to declare that no person, individual or
corporate, should get between the settler and the gov-
ernment on the public domain. This position was taken
when the subject of class legislation was presented in its
most objectionable form. Had the Montana land grant
become a law, and a precedent for future legislation,
your committee cannot see any rights that the people
could have in these lands, other than through the suf-
ference of a few political adventurers or capitalists that
may meet at every session of our congress.
Your committee would respectfully represent that
cities on the western slope of this continent, and others
more centrally located, have sprung up, as if by magic,
eclipsing in material wealth and prosperity many of our
most favored cities after a growth of half a century.
This prosperity we offer as a demonstrative proof of the
change asked for by the petition. The laborer in this
case was master of the situation; he had only to labor
and to thrive. The British land system had not been
sufficiently perfected by our government to take in this
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 163
distant region, from him a portion of his hard-earned
toil. Wherever the hand of nature had planted her treas-
ures he was free to make his lodgement; to supply civil-
ized life with any and all its wants. It is the principle
that we wish to see applied to all our agricultural lands.
Your committee would here assert, as we have before
intimated, that this system is not of American, but rather
of British origin. The lands were in that country at an
early day safely placed in the hands of a few individuals
and they and their descendants have always composed
the government of that country; that after six hundred
years, true to their instincts, the "land monopolies" sent
to our shores their Alabamas to prey upon our commerce
and destroy our institutions. The power created by this
system has all this while been steadily pursuing its
relentless course, opposing any measures that may have
for its objects the amelioration of the condition of the
people. Your committee would respectfully submit that
in no other form does wealth become so objectionable to
the moral, social and material interests of the country.
The lands in the colonies previous to the revolution were
considered as belonging to the crown; the British rulers
were careful not to adopt a general system, but made
special grants "to court favorites, or those having friends
at court," much the same as is now practiced at every
session of our Congress. This power, then, it would
seem, was not contemplated by this government, that we
ought to treat it as an interloper foreign to our interests
and monarchial in its pretensions. In the language of
the poet-
A monster of such frightful mien,
That to be hated, is but to be seen.
In view of the false position that politicians have ac-
corded to labor and industry, we would propose the fol-
1 64 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
lowing sentiment in order to restore them to their proper
position, viz: "The tools to those that have the ability
and skill to use them, and the lands to those who have
the will and heart to cultivate them."
POLITICAL ACTION. If there is one fact more than an-
other which has impressed itself upon the attention of
workingmen during the past year, it is the absolute ne-
cessity of cutting aloof from the ties and trammels of
party, manipulated in the interests of capital, and using
the advantages conferred by American citizenship -the
ballot- to the furtherance of their own interests and wel-
fare. It is not the possession but the proper use of this
privilege which can avail aught in the struggle for the
mastery. In fact, it may well be questioned whether, in
many instances, it has not proven a curse rather than a
blessing to its possessors. No matter by what name the
various political elements have been divided, no matter
upon what issues the line of demarcation has been drawn,
the moment the interests of capital have been endan-
gered, the tocsin of alarm has been sounded, party ties
have been obliterated, and our so-called legislators have
stood shoulder to shoulder, .as one man, in defence of a
common interest. The legislation of the past has been
the legislation of capital ; the legitimate result of which
is seen in the present menial, degraded position occupied
by the very class whose welfare it was pledged to defend.
The interests of the consumer has always been the
primary, the interests of the producer the secondary con-
sideration, in our state and national councils. Nor
should this be a matter of surprise. Indeed, it would
be strange were it otherwise. We had no right to expect
a different result. That an antagonism between labor
and capital should or must necessarily exist, we do not
believe; that under our iniquitous monetary and finan-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 165
cial system -the result of legislation -it does exist, is a
self-evident proposition. No man will refuse to recog-
nize the truth of this statement; neither can any one,
who has had practical experience and has looked about
him in the world, fail to perceive that the one grand
cause of all the evils to which we have alluded, and
many others which will forever remain unspoken and
unwritten, but which are silently gnawing at the hearts
of thousands, is the robbery which capital perpetrates
on labor through legislation.
Under these circumstances the aim of our law-mak-
ers-taken almost exclusively from the ranks of capital -
has been to foster, protect and perpetuate these wrongs,
a position to which the producing classes have been a
party by their virtual acquiescence and endorsement.
They have been satisfied with the husks, with the casket
rather than the jewel ; they have placed too much de-
pendence on the opinion of others and too little on their
own; the appeal of the demagogue has accomplished
more than the words of earnest, practical common sense.
While they have expended their commiseration on the
down trodden masses of the old wo rid -and thanked
God that American institutions were not as other institu-
tions, they seemed to ignore the fact that human nature
was the same in the new as in the old world, and that
these same institutions were assimilating daily more and
more to those to whom it seemed to be their pleasure and
their duty to decry.
But, we are speaking of the past, we have brighter an-
ticipations for the future. The signs of the times are
propitious. The working classes are fast rousing from
the lethargy in which they have been sunk. They are
realizing that, as the evils which weigh with crushing
effect upon society, are legislative in character, that the
1 66 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
remedy must therefore be legislative. They realize,
also, that a new era has been ushered in, that the sec-
tional issues of the past have been swept away; that the
civil war which has blighted our fair land has ceased ;
that our national authority has been re-established over
every rood of American soil, and the starry flag floats
once more in undisputed triumph from the Kennebec to
the Rio Grande ; that with these results have come new
duties and responsibilities; that during the period of
transformation it becomes their duty to prepare them-
selves for the impending conflict. They realize, as they
have never realized before, their tremendous responsi-
bility; they know that issues of a more permanent char-
acter than those which have heretofore engrossed the
attention of the American people must now be presented,
issues, doubtless, which time will change and modify,
but which, nevertheless, will remain as monuments of
their folly or discernment as they may determine to
make their influence felt in this eventful crisis; issues,
too, in which their interests are more indissolubly con-
nected than any which have ever preceded them.
Fellow-citizens, your duty, under these circumstances,
is plain and unmistakable. It is to discard the clap-trap
issues of the past; select your representatives in the state
and national councils from the ranks of labor; from men
who acknowledge allegiance to no ism or party; from
those whose welfare is your welfare, and who, when the
conflict comes, as come it must, will be found nobly
battling for your rights, and the recognition of human
progress.
We have faith, fellow-citizens, that you will be found
equal to the task of assuring your own liberty. We be-
lieve the men who make nations great by their toil,
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 167
and who defend them with their bayonets, will be able
to maintain, as well as institute a popular government;
will be able to overcome the principles and efface the
legislation, which in creating monopolies, create priv-
ileged classes incompatible with that equality of right
which is the basis of a true democracy.
At the last session of the national Congress, the Na-
tional Labor Party was ushered into existence ; at its next
meeting we hope its organization will be more thorough-
ly effected ; and trust that by the fall of 1868 its ramifica-
tions may be found in every city, town and village in the
United States, and that by united exertion and persever-
ance, the highest official in the land, for the first time in
the history of our country, may be elected by the voice
of the people -on the broad platform of justice, equal-
ity and fraternity.
CONCLUSION. Having somewhat briefly referred to
a few of the more prominent topics which presented
themselves to the committee, we trust you may find in
the suggestions thrown out, something worthy of your
attention. We now extend a cordial invitation to all to
participate in our deliberations. Come from the north
and the south, from the east and the west; come from
the anvil and the loom; from the work-bench and the
forge-every craft and every trade; come as the repre-
sentatives of states' assemblies or trades' unions -singly
or in delegations, all will be equally welcome; come
with fraternal greetings, bearing the olive branch of
peace; come prompted by a common interest and actu-
ated by a common motive; come forgetting the past and
its issues, ignoring alike the appeals and denunciations
of partizanship ; come realizing the importance of the
crisis and the necessity of decided action; come as lovers
1 68 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
of a common country, and help by your counsels and de-
liberations to hasten that glorious time,
When man to man the world o'er
Shall brothers be and a' that.
When worth, not wealth, shall rule mankind ; when tyr-
anny and oppression of every character shall be up-
rooted and destroyed ; and when the laborers of Ameri-
ca, intelligent, united, and disenthralled, shall occupy
that proud position which God in his kind providence
intended they should occupy -a position they never can
aspire to until the evils complained of are redressed by
and through their own exertions. Finally, brethren,
come one and all and help to marshall those mighty
forces of labor, which, when disciplined, will march to
certain victory.
A. C. CAMERON, Illinois, T. A. ARMSTRONG, Penn-
sylvania, WM. B. ILES, Georgia, OILMAN RAND, Massa-
chusetts, J. R. BOLAN, New York, Committee.
3 . CHICAGO CONGRESS, 1867
(a) DELEGATES
Workingman's Advocate, Aug. 24, 31, 1867.
ILLINOIS -Samuel E. Pinta, Typographical Union,
No. 1 6, Chicago; Mark Morrisey, Stone Cutters' Union,
Chicago; Simon O'Neil, Chas. M. Newland, Trades'
Assembly, Chicago; J. W. Overacker, Coopers' Union,
Chicago; Jacob G. Selig, Cigar Makers' Union, Chi-
cago; Thomas McQueeny, Bricklayers' Union, Chi-
cago; Thos. A. Hogan, Plasterers' Union, Chicago;
Edmund Crossfield, Painters' Union, Chicago; A. C.
Cameron, State Workingmen's Convention, Illinois;
Henry Van Dorn, Boot and Shoemakers' Union, Chi-
cago; Lewis L. Wadsworth, Machinists' and Black-
smiths' Union, Chicago; James Irwin, Carriage Makers'
Union, Chicago; P. K. Watts, Carpenters' and Joiners'
Union, Locomotive Firemen's Union, No. 15, Ma-
chinists' and Blacksmiths' Union, No. 2, Locomotive
Engineers, No. 24, Centralia; George W. Ritchie, Plas-
terers' Union, Springfield; John Bingham, American
Miners' Association, La Salle; Albert H. Brown, Na-
tional Typographical Union, N.A., Chicago.
NEW YORK [City?]-Jno. Moessinger, Piano Makers'
Union; Adam Stock, German Varnishers' Union; Wm.
J. Jessup, G. P. Taylor, Workingmen's Union ; Martin
Simon, Carvers' Union; Jno. Ennis, Plasterers' Union;
Frederick Muhlmeister, Cabinet Makers' Union.
MARYLAND- B. E. Green, Pattern Makers' Union,
Baltimore; Wm. Gather, Carpenters' Union, Baltimore;
James Hyland, Ship Joiners' Union, Baltimore; Thos.
Ayers, Bricklayers' International Union, Baltimore.
I7 p AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
MICHIGAN -Richard Trevellick, Trades' Assembly
Detroit, and Grand Eight Hour League, Michigan;
Thos. D. Hawley, Eight Hour League, No. 13 [Ovid] ;
Sylvester Doremus, Eight Hour League, No. 25, Ovid;
Henry H. Ives, Land and Labor Reform Union, No. i,
Grand Rapids; Wm. A. Burkey, Land and Labor Re-
form Union, No. 2, Grand Rapids; Cyrus Peabody,
Eight Hour League, No. 21, Pontiac.
PENNSYLVANIA -Joseph Saunders, Window Glass
Blowers' Union, Birmingham; Philip Zell, Hollow-
ware Glass Blowers' Union, Birmingham; James
Michels, Window-glass Blowers' Union, Birmingham;
Alexander Scott, Iron Boilers' Union, Birmingham; J.
W. Krepps, Trades' Assembly, Pittsburgh ; Wm. Hard-
ing, Coachmakers' International Union, Philadelphia;
W. H. Sylvis, Moulders' International Union.
OHIO-C. H. Lucker, Tailors' International Union,
Cincinnati ; J. J. Neal, John Tomlinson, Trades' Assem-
bly, Cincinnati; T. W Linsted, Machinists and Black-
smiths' Union, Mt. Vernon.
WASHINGTON, D.C.- George O. Cook, Bricklayers'
Union; James J. Mitchell, Workingmen's Assembly.
CONNECTICUT -C. W. Gibson, Trades' Assembly,
Norwich; Alfred W. Phelps, Carpenters and Joiners'
Union, New Haven; John HinchclifTe, Mountville; J.
A. Armstrong, Danielsville; J. P. Ellacott, Rockville.
MISSOURI -Andrew Schroeder, Ship Carpenters' and
Caulkers' Union, St. Louis.
WISCONSIN -Thomas Hughes, Eight Hour League,
No. 8, Beaver Dam.
[Admitted at later sessions:] J. E. Laibold, Eden
Auxiliary Anti-Monopoly Association [Illinois] ; D.
Evans and A. Campbell, State Anti-monopoly Associa-
tion [Illinois] ; R. W. Cowell, Trades' Assembly, Louis-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 171
ville; O. J. Swegels, Eight Hour League, Buffalo; W.
H. Stewart, Eight Hour League, Grand Rapids, Mich.;
T. J. Nine, Eight Hour League, St. John's, Mich. ; Wm.
Hibbard, Eight Hour League, Muskegon, Mich.; W.
Oakes, Eight Hour League, Corunna, Mich.; W. Park-
er, Trades' Assembly, Chicago; Frank Lawler, Ship
Carpenters' and Caulkers' Union, Chicago; William
Hayward, Ship Carpenters' and Caulkers' Union, Mil-
waukee, Wisconsin ; John Webber, Ship Carpenters' and
Caulkers' Union, Chicago. [William H. Sylvis, repre-
senting the Moulders' Union of Philadelphia, was seat-
ed pending arrival of his credentials, and Mr. Schlager,
of the German Workingmen's Association of Chicago,
was seated by resolution adopted as substitute for report
of Committee on Credentials.]
(b) REPORTS OF OFFICERS
[The annual address of President Whaley emphasized
the need of funds ; recommended salaries for the Presi-
dent and secretary; complained of the difficulty of deter-
mining who were members of the National Labor Un-
ion, "as the constituency of that body had been indistinct-
ly defined and but questionably established;" suggested
a per capita tax to be collected by the unions represented ;
recited his appointment of vice-presidents, or organiz-
ers, for states not provided ; recommended establishing
a national organ, and stated that the platform had been
invariably adopted by all unions before which it was
brought for ratification. The corresponding secretary
emphasized the need of a stronger central organization,
and the need of funds to pay lecturers. He reported that
he had written 1,387 letters, received 956, distributed
2,157 printed letters, 5,816 addresses and circulars, re-
ceived $75.38 for printing the proceedings and expended
1 72 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
$491.62. The treasurer's report showed receipts $205.21
disbursements $187.25. Following is extract from
report of the corresponding secretary, C. W. Gibson.]
The past year has been very eventful to the labor cause,
no previous year so much so; many gratifying results
have been attained; the long hour system has received
many very telling blows, and the reasonable demands of
the laboring millions of our country for more time for
mental culture, social advantages and refreshing rest,
have been acknowledged by the legislative wisdom of
some of the most powerful states of the union. . .
Much pains has been taken to investigate the condition
of education among the children of laboring men ; in all
factory villages there are many children in the mills
that should be in the schools, and the deficiency of edu-
cation is becoming .a painful evil which demands serious
attention. This Congress should be emphatically heard
on this subject. As secretary, I corresponded largely
with all those who have taken an active interest in the
labor cause, and with cheering results; a very great
number of intelligent minds may readily be enlisted in
a general and united plan, so soon as that plan can be
presented. But they are waiting united method of pro-
cedure; that method this Congress should present. It
should be not only national, but international. There
is much activity and intelligent enterprise beyond the
waters, and we may gain much strength and encourage-
ment from them, while our free institutions should shed
their light upon the darkness of usurpation and mon-
archical oppression.
Political action has proved available in the last year;
both political parties have respected and dreaded our
influence, and to that we must look for the redress of a
part of our grievances. The next presidential campaign
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 173
should feel our influence. Congress must make our ac-
quaintance in the shape of members who will vote to
establish the eight hour rule in all public works; and
also who will vote for a proper distribution of taxation
and relieve the labor of the country from some of its
pressing load; uniting our political strength and ignor-
ing all other political parties, we can make ourselves
felt in the nation as we have in some of the states.
The enormous profits now made by exchanges, bro-
kers, etc., who stand between the producers and consum-
ers, should engage the serious attention of the Congress ;
monopoly now ruins the land, excessive prices for all the
industry of the country. The Congress should devise
a medium of exchange to remove the hungry throng from
between the producer and consumer, and supply the toil-
ing masses with articles of necessary consumption at first
prices.
As a whole, the past year has been full of hope and
encouragement to the laboring men ; we have not gained
all we could wish, but we have gained more than we
expected. . . If, in no other way, let the working
men accept the eight hour rule with a reasonable dis-
count, not of twenty per cent, because eight hours on the
eight hour plan are worth more than eight hours on the
ten hour prlan. Workingmen will do well to get the eight
hour rule established; the wages will regulate them-
selves, employers cannot. . .
(c) CONSTITUTION
[The Baltimore Congress had provided for a commit-
tee to report on a draft of a constitution at the next Con-
gress; and this, adopted with amendments, contained
the following.]
ARTICLE i, Section i. This organization shall be
1 74 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
known as the National Labor Union, and its jurisdiction
shall be confined to the United States.
ARTICLE 2, Section i. The National Labor Union
shall be composed of such labor organizations as may
now, or hereafter exist, having for their object the amel-
ioration of the condition of those who labor for a living.
ARTICLE 2, Section 2. Every international or national
organization shall be entitled to three representatives
[and a vice-president at large] ; 20 state organizations to
two ; trades unions and all other [labor] 21 organizations
to one representative in the National Labor Congress,
provided that representatives shall derive their election
direct from the organization they claim to represent.
ARTICLE 2, Section 3. Ex-representatives, upon pre-
sentation of certificate of good standing in their organi-
zation, shall be entitled to a voice, without a vote, in the
National Labor Congress.
ARTICLE 3, Section i. The officers . . . shall
consist of a president [salary $1,000], first and second
vice-presidents (to be chosen from different states), a
recording secretary, treasurer, and a corresponding rep-
resentative in every state.
ARTICLE 4, Section i. The president . . . dur-
ing the recess [he] shall have power to appoint corre-
sponding representatives in states where they have not
been elected, and shall fill all vacancies. . .
ARTICLE 4, Section 5. It shall be the duty of the cor-
responding representatives to correspond at least once a
month with the president, giving to him a synopsis of the
progress of the movement in his state. Failure on the
part of a corresponding representative to correspond
with the president for two months shall be sufficient cause
for his removal. The necessary expenses of his office
20 Struck out in 1868.- EDS
21 Inserted in 1868.- EDS.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 175
shall be paid from the funds of this National Labor Un-
ion.
ARTICLE 4, Section 6. It shall be the duty of each
organization to report to the corresponding representa-
tive of their state, at least once per month, such informa-
tion as may be necessary to the performance of his duty.
ARTICLE 6. -Any organization numbering 50 mem-
bers or less shall pay $i, and each union numbering over
50, and less than 100 members, shall pay $2, and all un-
ions that number over 200 members, and less than 500
members, shall pay $5, and all unions numbering over
500 members shall pay $6 annually.
(d) PLATFORM AND POLITICAL ACTION
[Committee on political organization:] Your com-
mittee to whom was referred the subject of National
Labor Organization, have had the same under consider-
ation, and beg leave to report that in their judgment, the
time has arrived when the industrial classes should cut
themselves aloof from party ties and predilections, and
organize themselves into a National Labor Party, the
object of which shall be to secure by proper legislation
the labor reforms necessary to the prosperity of the
nation, and that we recommend to the various local or-
ganizations of workingmen, whenever they may deem
it expedient, to nominate candidates for the various of-
fices to be filled, and to support them at the ballot box;
and we further recommend to every friend of the labor
movement to vote for no candidate not unequivocally
pledged to support the principles of the labor reform
organization.
A. C. CAMERON, JOHN S. TOMLINSON, J. W. KREPPS,
W. A. BERKEY, H. STOCK, ALFRED W. PHELPS, A.
SCHROEDER, JAMES HYLAND, R. W. COWELL/ JAMES J.
MITCHELL.
176 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
We beg further to present the following Declaration
of Principles:
We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men
are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator
with certain inalienable rights; that among them are
life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure
these rights, governments are instituted among men, de-
riving their just powers from the consent of the gov-
erned.
That there are but two pure forms of government, the
autocratic and the democratic; under the former the
will of the individual sovereign is the supreme law, un-
der the latter the sovereignty is vested in the whole peo-
ple, all other forms being a modification of the one or the
other of these principles, and that ultimately one or
other of these forms must prevail throughout all civi-
lized nations, and it is now for the American people to
determine which of these principles shall triumph.
That the design of the founders of the republic was to
institute a government upon the principle of absolute
inherent sovereignty in the people, and that would give
to each citizen the largest political and religious liberty
compatible with the good order of society, and secure to
each the right to enjoy the fruits of his labor and talents,
that when laws are enacted destructive of these ends, they
are without moral binding force, and it is the right and
duty of the people to alter, amend or abolish them, and
institute such others, founding them upon the principles
of equity, as to them may seem most likely to effect their
prosperity and happiness.
Prudence will indeed dictate that important laws long
established should not be changed for light and transient
causes, and experience has shown that the American
people are more disposed to suffer while evils are suf-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 177
ferable, than to change the forms and laws to which
they have been accustomed. But when a long train of
legislative abuses, pursuing invariably the same object,
evinces a design to subvert the spirit of freedom and
equality upon which our institutions are founded, and
reduce them to a state of servitude, it is their right- it is
their duty to abolish such laws and provide new guards
for their future security. Such has been the patient
suffering of the wealth-producing classes of the United
States, and such is now the necessity which constrains
them to put forth an organized and united effort for
maintaining their natural rights, which are imperilled
by the insidious schemes and unwarranted aggressions
of unscrupulous bankers and usurers by means of unwise
and corrupt legislation.
We further hold -that all property or wealth is the
product of physical and intellectual labor, employed in
productive industry and in the distribution of the pro-
ductions of labor; that laborers ought of right, and
would under a just monetary system receive or retain the
larger proportion of their productions; that the wrongs,
oppressions and destitution which laborers are suffering
in most departments of legitimate enterprise and useful
occupation, do not result from insufficiency of produc-
tion but from the unfair distribution of the products of
labor between non-producing capital and labor.
That money is the medium of distribution to non-pro-
ducing capital and producing labor, the rate of interest
determining what proportion of the products of labor
shall be awarded to capital for its use, and what to labor
for its productions; that the power to make money and
regulate its value is an essential attribute of sovereignty,
the exercise of which is by the constitution of the United
States wisely and properly granted to Congress, and it is
I 7 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
the imperative duty of Congress to institute it upon
such a wise and just basis that it shall be directly under
the control of the sovereign people who produce the
value it is designed to represent, measure and exchange,
that it may be a correct and uniform standard of value,
and distribute the products of labor equitably between
capital and labor according to the service or labor per-
formed in their production.
That the law enacting the so called national banking
system is a delegation by Congress of the sovereign pow-
er to make money and regulate its value to a class of
irresponsible banking associations, thereby giving to
them the power to control the value of all the property
in the nation, and to fix the rewards of labor in every
department of industry, and is inimical to the spirit of
liberty and subversive of the principles of justice upon
which our democratic republican institutions are found-
ed, and without warrant in the constitution; justice, rea-
son and sound policy demands its immediate repeal and
the substitution of legal-tender treasury notes as the ex-
clusive currency of the nation.
That this money monopoly is the parent of all monop-
olies -the very root and essence of slavery -railroad,
warehouse and all other monopolies of whatever kind
or nature are the outgrowth of and subservient to this
power, and the means used by it to rob the enterprising
industrial wealth-producing classes of their talents and
labor.
That as government is instituted to protect life and
secure the rights of property, each should share its just
and proper proportion of the burthens and sacrifices
necessary for its maintenance and perpetuity, and that
the exemption from taxation of bank capital and gov-
ernment bonds, bearing double and bankrupting rates
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 179
of interest, is a species of dangerous and unjust class
legislation opposed to the spirit of our institutions, and
contrary to the principles of sound morality and en-
lightened reason.
That our monetary, financial and revenue laws are in
letter and spirit opposed to the principles of freedom and
equality upon which our democratic republican institu-
tions are founded, there is in all their provisions mani-
festly a studied design to shield non-producing capital
from its just proportion of the burdens necessary for the
support of the government, imposing them mainly on the
industrial wealth-producing classes, thereby condemn-
ing them to lives of unremunerated toil, depriving them
of the ordinary conveniences and comforts of life ; of the
time and means necessary for social enjoyment, intellec-
tual culture and moral improvement; and ultimately re-
ducing them to a state of practical servitude.
We further hold that while these unrighteous laws of
distribution remain in force, laborers cannot, by any
system of combination or co-operation, secure their nat-
ural rights. That the first and most important step to-
wards the establishment of the rights of labor, is the
institution of a system of true co-operation between non-
producing capital and labor. That to effect this most
desirable object, money, the medium of distribution to
capital and labor, must be instituted upon such a wise
and just principle that instead of being a power to cen-
tralize the wealth in the hands of a few bankers, usurers,
middlemen and non-producers generally, it shall be a
power that will distribute products to producers in ac-
cordance with the labor or service performed in their
production -the servant and not the master of labor.
This done the natural rights of labor will be secured,
and co-operation in production and in the distribution
i8o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
of products, will follow as a natural consequence. The
weight will be lifted from the back of the laborer, and
the wealth producing classes will have the time and the
means necessary for social enjoyment, intellectual cul-
ture and moral improvement, and the non-producing
classes compelled to earn a living by honest industry.
We hold that this can be effected by the issue of treasury
notes made a legal tender in the payment of all debts
public and private, and convertible at the option of the
holder into government bonds, bearing a just rate of
interest, sufficiently below the rate of increase in the
national wealth by natural production, as to make an
equitable distribution of the products of labor between
non-producing capital and labor, reserving to Congress
the right to alter the same when, in their judgment the
public interest would be promoted thereby; giving the
government creditor the right to take the lawful money
or the interest bearing bonds at his election, with the
privilege to the holder to reconvert the bonds into money
or the money into bonds, at pleasure.
We hold this to be the true American, or people's
monetary system, adapted to the genius of our democra-
tic republican institutions, in harmony with the letter
and spirit of the constitution and suited to the wants of
the government and business interests of the nation ; that
it would furnish a medium of exchange, having equal
powers, a uniform value and fitted for the performance
of all the functions of money, co-extensive with the juris-
diction of government. That with a just rate per cent
interest on the government bonds, it would effect the
equitable distribution of the products of labor between
non-producing capital and labor, giving to laborers a
fair compensation for their products, and to capital
a just reward for its use; remove the necessity for exces-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 181
sive toil and afford the industrial classes the time and
means necessary for social and intellectual culture. With
the rate of interest at three per cent on the government
bonds, the national debt would be liquidated within less
than thirty years without the imposition or collection
of one farthing of taxes for that purpose. Thus it would
dispense with the hungry hoard of assessors, tax-gather-
ers and government spies that are now harassing the in-
dustrial classes and despoiling them of their substance.
We further hold that it is essential to the prosperity
and happiness of the people and the stability of our dem-
ocratic republican institutions, that the public domain
be distributed as widely as possible among the people; a
land monopoly being equally as oppressive to the people
and dangerous to our institutions, as the present money
monopoly. To prevent this the public lands should be
sold in reasonable quantities, and to none but actual oc-
cupants [and to them at the minimum price established
by the government. When grants of the public land are
deemed necessary for the encouragement of important
public improvements, the fee simple should not be con-
veyed, but only the proceeds of the sale thereof.] "
We further hold that intelligence and virtue in the
sovereignty are necessary to a wise administration of
justice, and that as our institutions are founded upon the
theory of sovereignty in the people, in order to their
preservation and perpetuity, it is the imperative duty of
Congress to make such wise and just regulations as shall
afford all the means of acquiring the knowledge requisite
to the intelligent exercise of the privileges and duties
pertaining to sovereignty, and that Congress should or-
dain that eight hours labor between the rising and setting
of the sun should constitute a day's work in all govern-
22 Bracketed words struck out at session of 1868. - EDS.
1 82 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
ment works and places where the national government
has exclusive jurisdiction, and that it is equally impera-
tive on the several states to make like provision by legal
enactment. Be it therefore unanimously
RESOLVED, that our first duty is now to provide as
speedily as possible a system of general organization in
accordance with the principles herein more specifically
set forth, and that each branch of industry shall be left
to adopt its own particular form of organization, sub-
ject only to such restraint as may be necessary to place
each organization within line, so as to act in harmony
in all matters pertaining to the welfare of the whole as
well as each of the parts, and that it is the imperative
duty of every man in each and every branch of industry
to aid in the formation of such labor organizations in his
respective branch and to connect himself therewith.
RESOLVED, that in co-operation, based upon just finan-
cial and revenue laws, we recognize a sure and lasting
remedy for the abuses of the present industrial system,
and that until the laws of the nation can be remodelled
so as to recognize the rights of men instead of classes,
the system of co-operation carefully guarded will do
much to lessen the evils of our present system. We,
therefore, hail with delight the organization of co-oper-
ative stores and workshops and would urge their forma-
tion in every section of the country, and in every branch
of business. . .
RESOLVED, that where a workingman is found capable
and available for any office, the preference should in-
variably be given to such person. . .
[On the following subjects the resolutions were iden-
tical with those of the Baltimore Congress of 1866,
viz., working women, improved dwellings for laborers,
strikes, mechanics' institutes, recommendation for the
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 183
unemployed to proceed to the public lands. At a later
session of this Congress a motion that the platform be
considered section by section was lost by a vote of twenty-
three to twenty-four, and, after a speech by Trevellick
in favor of greenbacks, a speech by Peabody in favor of
gold and silver, and the adoption of an amendment strik-
ing out the word, "exclusive," the previous question was
carried and the report was adopted as a whole.]
[By Cameron] RESOLVED, that the president of the
National Labor Union is hereby instructed to issue on
the first of November next, to the several organizations
in affiliation with this movement, a circular requesting
them to express an opinion on the following questions:
First, Shall a National Labor ticket be placed before the
people for their suffrages at the next presidential elec-
tion? Second, If you say "aye," who is your choice for
candidate? That on the first of March next the presi-
dent shall, if a majority decide in favor of placing a tick-
et in the field, announce the fact to the several organiza-
tions, as also the names of the persons agreed upon by the
greater number of organizations who shall be the nom-
inees of this National Union. A motion to lay the same
on the table was lost and the resolution adopted.
(e) EIGHT HOURS AND PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT
[By Committee on eight hours, Harding, Hibbard,
Cook] WHEREAS, it is of vital importance, looking to
the speedy and permanent settlement of this great ques-
tion, that the national Congress should at its next session,
enact a law establishing eight hours as a day's labor for
all government employees ; and whereas, such a bill has
passed the lower house, and is now in the hands of the
finance committee of the senate; therefore,
RESOLVED, that the several organizations of labor
1 84 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
throughout the country be requested to sign petitions
prepared by the president of the National Labor Union,
and forward them through the corresponding repre-
sentatives to a committee of three to be appointed by the
president in the District of Columbia, who shall at such
time as to them may seem most appropriate, present them
to Congress, asking for the adoption of such a law.
Your committee wish also further to state that Eight
Hour Laws have been passed by the legislatures of six
states, but for all practical purposes they might as well
have never been placed on the statute book, and can only
be described as frauds on the laboring classes ; that your
committee are not at all surprised at the course of action
on the part of the state legislatures -we should have
been surprised were it otherwise -for the history of past
legislation shows us that whenever the laboring classes
applied in any way for legislative protection to labor
that they were always deceived, and that no reliance can
be placed in any pledges either party makes to us.
Your committee would, therefore, in view of these
facts, recommend the following resolutions:
RESOLVED, that the workingmen of the United States
ought to organize themselves under the auspices of the
National Labor Union, and that they proceed to elect
from the ranks of labor such men as may be most suit-
able to represent their interests in the state and national
legislatures, whose primary object shall be to enact an
efficient eight-hour law.
RESOLVED, that the National Labor Congress appoint
a person to represent them, and draw up a petition, ad-
dressed to the United States Congress, asking it to adopt
an Eight-hour Law for the benefit of government em-
ployees, and that the several eight-hour leagues, and
other labor societies in the different states, be requested
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 185
to draw up similar petitions for presentation to Con-
gress, through the agency of the representative of the
National Labor Union. [Adopted.] . . .
[By Mr. Cameron] RESOLVED, that it is the sense of
this Congress that it is inexpedient for any state or local-
ity, under existing circumstances, to attempt the adop-
tion of the eight-hour system, until the same has been
recognized by the national legislature. The resolution
was not adopted. . .
[By Mr. Mitchell, of Washington] RESOLVED, that
we deprecate the employment on government works of
persons who are hostile to the interests of labor, in prefer-
ence to others in every way more competent. That when-
ever such cases become known to the president of the
National Labor Union, that he immediately appeal to
the president of the United States for the removal of
such person or persons. [Adopted.] . . .
(f) NEGRO LABOR
Mr. Phelps, from the Committee on Negro Labor, re-
ported that, having had the subject under consideration,
and after having heard the suggestions and opinions of
several members of this Convention -pro and con -have
arrived at the following conclusions:
That, while we feel the importance of the subject, and
realize the danger in the future of competition in me-
chanical negro labor, yet we find the subject involved in
so much mystery, and upon it so wide diversity of opin-
ion amongst our members, we believe that it is inexpedi-
ent to take action on the subject in this National Labor
Congress.
RESOLVED, that the subject of negro labor be laid over
till the next session of the National Labor Congress.
The report was extensively discussed, Mr. Trevellick
1 86 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
taking strong ground against it on the ground that the
negro will bear to be taught his duty, and has already
stood his ground nobly when member of a trades union.
Mr. Harding opposed it because he did not like to
confess to the world that there was a subject with which
they were afraid to cope, and Mr. Green thought that
the consideration of the subject had been too long de-
ferred already. He well remembered that this very
question was at the root of the rebellion, which was the
war of the poor white men of the South, who forced the
slaveholders into the war. (Interruption.)
Mr. Peabody was against the adoption of the report.
He did not want to see a single labor organization mis-
represented in that congress, black or white. The diffi-
culty, if ever laid over, would be even greater than now.
Mr. Phelps said in New Haven there were a number
of respectable colored mechanics, but they had not been
able to induce the trades' unions to admit them. He
asked was there any union in the states which would ad-
mit colored men.
Mr. Van Dorn was sorry that the word "black" or
"colored" had been used in the convention. He be-
lieved in meeting the difficulty, however, as it had been
raised, and would vote to take in the black worker as a
duty to a common brotherhood. The colored man was
industrious, and susceptible of improvement and ad-
vancement.
Mr. Kuykendall said that the negro or white man had
not been mentioned in the constitution already adopted,
and there was no need of entering on any discussion of
the matter.
Mr. Mitchell had looked on the matter as being fully
settled.
Mr. Gather understood the intention to be to legis-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 187
late for the good of the entire laboring community
of the United States. There was no necessity for the
foisting of the subject of colored labor, or the appoint-
ment of a committee to report thereon. He had no
doubt that the blacks would combine together of them-
selves and by themselves, without the assistance of the
whites. God speed them; but let not the whites try to
carry them on their shoulders.
Mr. Ellacott moved to recommit the report to the
hands of the committee, and Mr. Lucker suggested that
they would not be expected to report.
Several other gentlemen concurred in this view,
claiming that these questions were settled when the con-
stitution was adopted.
Mr. Gibson said it would be time enough to talk about
admitting colored men to trades' unions and to the Con-
gress when they applied for admission.
Mr. Sylvis said this question had been already intro-
duced in the South, the whites striking against the blacks,
and creating an antagonism which will kill off the
trades' unions, unless the two be consolidated. There is
no concealing the fact that the time will come when the
"negro will take possession of the shops if we have not
taken possession of the negro. If the workingmen of the
white race do not conciliate the blacks, the black vote
will be cast against them."
Mr. Peabody said that the capitalists of New England
now employed foreign boys and girls in their mills, to
the almost entire exclusion of the native-born popula-
tion. They would seek to supplant these by colored
workers. He thought there was little danger of black
men wanting to enter white trades' unions any more than
Germans would try to join the English societies in Amer-
ica.
1 88 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
[The report was recommitted, and the committee
afterwards reported "that after mature deliberation they
had come to the conclusion that the constitution already
adopted prevented the necessity of reporting on the sub-
ject of negro labor." This report was adopted.]
(g) PUBLIC LANDS AND AGRICULTURE
[By Mr. Sylvis] WHEREAS, the Congress of the
United States have from time to time made appropria-
tions of large sums of money, and grants of public lands,
for the special benefits of railroads and other monop-
olies, and for the education and elevation of a portion of
the laborers of the country; therefore, be it
RESOLVED, that we respectfully petition Congress at
its next session to appropriate $25,000,000, to aid in
establishing the eight-hour system, co-operation and re-
moval of such of the poor as wish to go to the public do-
main, and for the general benefit of laborers, without
distinction of sex, color or locality. [Adopted.]
Mr. Sylvis called attention to an article in the morn-
ing Tribune, stating that the farmers of the country were
not represented in this body. It was false, as there were
some delegates present who represented nothing else.
[Committee on public lands:] The law-makers of
both our state and national legislatures have for a long
series of years made barter of the people's inheritance -
the public domain -the value of which lies chiefly in its
occupation and settlement. In doing this they have
turned our legislative halls into brokers' marts, instead
of sanctuaries of liberty. No republican government
has withstood the blighting influence of land monopoly
for a generation -never can, nor will. Carthage, Greece,
Rome, Venice, Russia, Turkey, Austria, Germany,
France, England, Switzerland, and unfortunately, our
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 189
own country, have furnished us with abundant proof of
this position. In the ownership of the soil lies the true
principles of manhood, independence, liberty and civ-
ilization, and the government which denies the people's
rights to that ownership soon loses its vitality- if a re-
public -and enters upon the throes of dissolution which
is but the work of time. The people's apparent indiffer-
ence is the monopolist's opportunity, and availing them-
selves of this they have corrupted our legislative halls
by subsidies, and literally stolen thousands of princely
domains, the broad acres of which were only held in
trust by the government for the people.
The course of our legislation recently, has tended to
the building up of greater monopolies, and the creation
of more powerful moneyed and landed aristocracies in
the United States than any that now overshadows the
destinies of Europe. Eight hundred millions of acres
of the people's lands have been legislated into the hands
of a few hundred individuals, who already assume a
haughty and insolent tone and bearing towards the peo-
ple and government, as did the patricians of ancient
Rome. These lands are held unimproved, and mainly
for speculative purposes. In that condition they yield
neither produce nor revenue, but if they were open to
settlement they would soon swarm with a busy popula-
tion, by whose thrift, industry and intelligence the wil-
derness would then be made to blossom as the rose.
Our course in regard to the public domain in permit-
ting mere speculators to locate with warrants and scrip
vast bodies of the choicest lands, leaving only occasional
strips of inferior land to be taken up by the actual settler
and tiller of the soil, acts like an embargo laid on the
productive energies of the people. This course has de-
terred many from becoming pioneers in clearing our
I9 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
vast primitive forests, and cultivating the almost bound-
less prairies of the west. The gigantic and expensive
war through which we have recently passed could and
would have been avoided had the government, at an
early day, adopted the policy of giving the public do-
main, in small parcels, to actual settlers only.
In view of the foregoing premises, we declare our-
selves opposed to making any further special grants of
the public domain to corporate bodies of any kind what-
soever, and we further declare ourselves opposed to the
building up of a landed aristocracy in this nation, be-
lieving that it will eventually tend to the subversion of
the liberty of the masses.
RESOLVED, that the policy of the government should
be to give, and not to sell, the public lands to actual set-
tlers, and none others.
RESOLVED, that all uncultivated lands held for pur-
poses of speculation should be subjected to taxation the
same as other lands in the same locality that may have
been improved.
RESOLVED, that the soil, like air, water and light, is
the free gift of a beneficent God to man, and we hold
that the traffic in any of these elements to be sacrile-
gious, and in direct contravention of the designs of the
Creator.
Signed by W. H. SYLVIS, JOHN HlNCHCLlFFE and
W. H. STEWART.
The report was adopted.
[By Mr. Green] WHEREAS, the great staple of the
south -cotton -has been heretofore not only the chief
basis of our commerce and exchange, but the source of
profitable employment to a large portion of the labor-
ing classes of New England who were engaged in its
manufacture; and
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 191
WHEREAS, nearly every branch of industry in the
north and west will suffer more or less, directly or in-
directly, if the United States should, as anticipated by
some, not only lose the export cotton trade, but failing
to grow enough for our own domestic use, thus forcing
American manufacturers to import cotton from abroad;
and
WHEREAS, the British Cotton Supply Association have
for a long time -been laboring to bring about such a re-
sult, so that instead of selling cotton to England the
United States would have to buy cotton of them -the
growth of India or Egypt; therefore, be it
RESOLVED, that this congress endorse and reiterate
the resolution adopted by the National Labor Congress
at Baltimore last year, to the effect that the speedy
restoration of the agricultural industry of the Southern
States is of vital importance to the industrial classes of
the north.
RESOLVED, that the speedy restoration of the Southern
States to their proper practical relations in the Union,
is indispensable to the restoration of their agricultural-
prosperity.
The resolutions were adopted.
[By Mr. Harding] RESOLVED, that a direct exchange
of produce and imports ought to be established between
the workingmen of the east and producers of the west,
and that the labor associations in the west ought to take
the place of the middle men, who now increase unduly
the price of the necessaries of life, and that measures be
established by said associations to effect the desirable ex-
change, and furnish workingmen with produce and im-
ports, such as coffee, etc., at a cost price as near as pos-
sible. Adopted.
[A communication was received from the Westfield
1 92 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Labor Association, of Chautauqua County, New York,
advocating exemption of homesteads from taxation.]
(h) APPRENTICES
[By Committee on Apprentices] WHEREAS, a great
difficulty exists in many mechanical branches of busi-
ness, from their being overstocked with apprentices, and
WHEREAS, the time has come when the apprentice
system is being more extensively used to the detriment
of those who have spent years in making themselves pro-
ficient in their different trades, therefore,
RESOLVED, that the National Labor Congress recom-
mend to the different branches of mechanics to guard
with care any encroachment on the part of capital in the
introduction of the apprentice system.
RESOLVED, that where apprentices are introduced into
trades we would recommend that those who have served
their time and have become skilled workmen, should
impress upon the minds of such apprentices the pro-
priety and necessity of an intellectual as well as mechan-
ical culture.
RESOLVED, that in the opinion of this body, it is highly
important that the legislatures of each state do pass a
law regulating the relations between employers and ap-
prentices, and do earnestly call upon the workingmen of
each state to use all their influence to secure such laws
as will protect employers, apprentices and journeymen.
Signed by the committee, JAMES MlCHELS, E. CROSS-
FIELD and J. W. RITCHIE. [Adopted.]
(i) MECHANICS' LIEN
[By Mr. Harding] RESOLVED, that we feel it our
duty, and do hereby pledge ourselves to use our best en-
deavors to secure the passage of such a law in our re-
spective states as will better secure the mechanics and
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 193
laborers their full pay for all work done or material
furnished upon any and all structures, whether the same
be done by contract, sub-contract or otherwise, and rec-
ommend that the members of the respective legislatures
be urged to aid in bringing about such an object.
[Adopted.]
(j) LOCAL UNIONS, ETC.
[At the convention of 1871, the majority of the dele-
gates were from unions organized under the following
resolution: -Eos.]
[By Mr. Harding] RESOLVED, that the president of
the National Labor Union shall have power to authorize
those whom he may appoint for such purpose to or-
ganize associations of workingmen who may subscribe
to the constitution and adopt the platform of the Na-
tional Labor Union, with power to make by-laws, etc.,
for their government, provided they do not conflict with
the constitution of the National Union, and whose ob-
ject shall be then social and material advancement of
the working classes. [Adopted.]
[A resolution was adopted favoring the publication
of a national organ, and adding that "as cooperation is a
vital and essential part of the labor movement" it could
be "successfully introduced in the publication of a na-
tional organ." Afterward resolutions favoring the des-
ignation of certain journals as the official organs were
laid on the table, after prolonged debate. The journals
named were the W 'orkingman 's Advocate of Chicago,
Boston Daily Voice, Grand Rapids Daily Advocate,
Detroit Daily Union, Pittsburgh TLvening Advocate,
Baltimore Laborer, Friend of Progress and Reform,
and Welcome Workman, of Philadelphia. Resolutions
were adopted authorizing the president to employ lec-
turers as soon as the finances would permit, ordering re-
194
AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
imbursement of the president's expenses, favoring taxa-
tion of government bonds, and a resolution introduced at
the request of the Tailors' International Union protesting
against the extension of the Howe sewing-machine pat-
ent. A committee, consisting of Sylvis, Lucker, Gathers,
Green, Ritchie and Whaley was selected to investigate
the system of cooperation. Resolutions for and against
the protective tariff were laid on the table.]
(k) ELECTION OF OFFICERS
President, J. C. C. Whaley; first vice-president, C. W.
Gibson; second vice president, C. H. Lucker; secretary,
O. J. Swegles; treasurer, John Hinchcliffe. Corre-
sponding representatives, elected by the delegates from
the various states, and ratified by the Congress: New
York, William J. Jessup ; Pennsylvania, John W.
Krepps ; Connecticut, A. W. Phelps ; Illinois, A. C. Cam-
eron; Wisconsin, William Heywood; Missouri, Theo-
dore Ayres; Ohio, I. S. Neale; Maryland, William
Gather ; District of Columbia, James J. Mitchell ; Mich-
igan, E. D. Burr; Kentucky, Robert W. Cowell.
Richard Trevellick was elected delegate to Europe
by a vote of 33 to 50.
4 . NEW YORK CONGRESS, 1868
Proceedings of the Second Session of the National Labor Union, at New
York City, September at, 1868, pamphlet, W. B. Selhcimer, Printer
(Philadelphia, 1868).
(a) DELEGATES
NATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS -Robert McKechnie, Al-
exander Troup, National Typographical Union ; A. W.
Phelps, E. L. Roseman, Andrew Turnbull, Carpenters'
and Joiners' National Union ; Samuel R. Gaul, National
Bricklayers' Union; Jonathan C. Fincher, International
Union of Machinists and Blacksmiths.
STATE ORGANIZATIONS -Henry B. Mulhall, Julius
Topp, New York State Workingmen's Assembly; J. W.
Le Barnes and John Prince, Massachusetts State Central
Organization of the Industrial Order of the People.
FEMALE LABOR ORGANIZATIONS -Miss Susan B. An-
thony, Workingwomen's Protective Association, No. i,
New York City; Mrs. Mary Kellogg Putnam, Work-
ingwomen's Protective Association, No. 2, New York
City; Mrs. Mary A. MacDonald, Women's Protective
Labor Union, Mt. Vernon, New York.
NEW YORK [City] - Wm. J. Jessup, N.Y. Working-
men's Union; James Ratchford, Bakers' Benevolent and
Trade Society; Frederick Muhlmeister, United Cab-
inet-Makers' Union; Daniel O'Callaghan, Bricklayers'
Union, No. 4; Geo. C. Platt, Union House Painters' As-
sociation ; Jacob Conde, New York Carvers' Association ;
Henry J. Keating, Housesmiths' M.P. Association;
Simon Schuck, German Varnishers' and Polishers' As-
sociation; Samuel Roberts, Gas and Steam-Fitters' As-
196 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
sociation ; Thomas J. Walsh, Bricklayers' Union, No. 2 ;
W. B. Newman, Paper Hangers' Association; Edward
Gordon, Slate Roofers' Union; Conrad Kuhn, Cigar-
makers' Union, No. 90; John Hewitt, United Coopers',
No. 4; Patrick Welch, Laborers' U.B. Society; John
Vincent, Typographical Union, No. 6; Edmond Grid-
ley, Carpenters' and Joiners' Consolidated Union; H.
Siebert, German Piano-makers' Association; R. R.
Williams, Amalgamated Society of C. and J. Branch,
No. i ; C. H. Lucker, Journeyman Tailors' P.B. Union;
James A. Bourke, N.Y.B. and P. Society of Practical
Painters.
NEW YORK [state] -John O'Donoghue, Working-
men's Assembly, Rochester ; Nathaniel Gillard, Roches-
ter Lodge, No. 20, K.O.S.C., Rochester; Jeremiah
Dooley, Mason Laborers' Union, Troy; John Burns,
Hudson River Laborers' Association, Verplancks ; John
J. Junio, Mechanical Order of the Sun, Syracuse; Jos-
eph A. Marrow, Bricklayers' Union, No. 19, Utica;
Daniel Mace, Carpenters and Joiners' Union, Albany;
John Moran, Bricklayers' Union, No. i, Brooklyn,
MARYLAND [Baltimore] -Aaron W. Stockton, Ship
Joiners' Union, No. i ; Peter W. Ford, Journeymen Cur-
riers' Association; Charles Luke, Journeymen Coopers'
Union, No. i ; Ignatius Batory, Labor Reform Associa-
tion ; Wm. S. King, Bricklayers' Union, No. i.
ILLINOIS -A. C. Cameron, Trades' Assembly and
Typographical Union, Chicago ; Alex. Campbell, Min-
ers' Union, No. 6, La Salle; Wm. H. Clark, Hope La-
bor Union, Lostant.
CONNECTICUT -C. W. Gibson, Trades' Assembly,
Norwich; James Grogan, Piano Carvers' Association,
New Haven.
NEW JERSEY- Philip N. Stockton, Bricklayers' and
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 197
Plasterers' Union, No. i, Jersey City; John T. Mellor,
Iron Molders' Union, No. 7, Jersey City; H. W. B.
Nichols, Bricklayers' Union, No. i, Newark; John
Pateman, House Painters' Union, No. i, Newark.
OHlO-John S. Tomlinson, Trades' Assembly, Cin-
cinnati ; L. A. Hine, Labor Union, Loveland.
MICHIGAN- Wm. S. Stocker, Ionia Labor Union, No.
4, Ionia.
INDIANA -A. M. Puett, Labor Union of the State of
Indiana, Greencastle.
PENNSYLVANIA -Philip McGovern, Lehigh Forge,
No. 15, Iron Boilers' Union, Allentown ; John McHoes,
Carpenters' and Joiners' Union No. 59, Easton.
[Delegates seated after first day's convention:] A. T.
Cavis, Workingmen's Assembly of the District of Col-
umbia; William H. Duryea, Mechanics' and Trades-
men's Permanent Building Association, New York
City; John Berry, Journeymen Gilders' Trade Society,
New York City ; J. E. Musselman, Brass Founders' and
Finishers' Union, New York City; James H. Mulligan,
Typographical Union, No. 4, Albany; W. H. Sylvis,
Iron Molders' International Co-operative and Protec-
tive Union; E. H. Heywood, Worcester Labor Reform
League, Worcester, Massachusetts ; H. L. Saxton, Work-
ingmen's Institute, Boston, Massachusetts; W. R. Good-
nough, Typographical Union, No. 72, Hartford, Con-
necticut; F. L. Parish, Carpenters' and Joiners' Union,
No. 67, Hartford; J. Jones, Labor Union, No. 2, Grand
Rapids, Michigan; J. C. Horey, Workingmen's Union
and Independent Order of Friendship, Black River
Falls, Wisconsin; Nelson W. Young, J.P. Co-operative
Association, New York City; John Maguire, Working-
men's Union of Missouri, St. Louis; S. J. Wallace, Car-
penters' and Joiners' Union, No. 18, Philadelphia;
198 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Martin Depenblenck, Bricklayers' Union, No. 12; John
Ennis, Operative Plasterers' Protective and Benefit So-
ciety; Richard Trevellick, Labor Union, State of Mich-
igan.
[The credentials of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, signed
by Susan B. Anthony, secretary of the Woman's Suffrage
Association, were referred by the committee to the con-
vention, and "caused a heated debate" on the ground
that the suffrage association was not a labor organiza-
tion, as stipulated in the by-laws. After speeches and
motions in favor by Sylvis, Lucker, Phelps, Wallace,
Junio, Cavis, Miss Anthony "and others," opposed by
Keating, Goodnough, Bourke, Young, "and others," the
credentials were accepted, yeas 45, nays 18. Later, on
objection made that endorsing female suffrage destroyed
all prospects of success of an independent Labor Party,
the following was adopted on motion of Cameron:]
RESOLVED, that by the admission of Mrs. Elizabeth
Cady Stanton as a delegate of this body, the National
Labor Congress does not regard itself as endorsing her
peculiar ideas, or committing itself to her position on
female suffrage, but simply as a representative from an
organization having for its object the "amelioration of
the condition of those who labor for a living."
(b) REPORTS OF OFFICERS
[President Whaley's address recited the course of
eight-hour legislation in Congress ; stated that he had re-
ceived "repeated requests from different parts of the
country to call an extra session of the National Labor
Union to take action upon the political issues then be-
fore the country." These he declined. He commented
on the lack of funds, cooperation and strikes, apprentice-
ship, female labor; and recommended "workingmen to
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 199
stand aloof and independent of political parties, so that
they may the better ally themselves and work with either
party, as their best interest may determine." The vice-
president and corresponding representative for the State
of New York, William J. Jessup, reported five thou-
sand signatures to the eight-hour petition; that he had
secured addresses of one thousand labor organizations
in the United States to which he had sent circulars ; that
the plasterers and painters of New York had secured the
eight-hour day; that six cooperative foundries in New
York State "have proved a grand success," as well as
the shops of printers and carpenters, but that the three
stores "are not as successful as other cooperative enter-
prises;" that the Knights of St. Crispin had made "sur-
prising progress;" that the German working men of
New York City had made "rapid-strides;" that "nearly
every union in this state of the once promising coach-
makers' organization" had ceased to exist; that the Ship
Carpenters', Caulkers' and Woolen-Spinners' Unions
are also "much demoralized ;" that the whole number of
trade and labor unions in the state was two hundred and
eighty-five, "a slight increase." Following is an extract
from Jessup's report.]
Much complaint has reached me during the year from
organizations located in the cities and towns bordering
on the lakes and rivers, dividing the British Provinces
from the United States, of the great influx every spring
of Canadian labor to the American side, to the great dis-
advantage of the mechanics and laborers resident in such
cities and towns. Many of these men work for what they
can get without respect to established wages or hours.
It is found to be almost impossible to sustain a trades'
union in such localities, or, in fact, a protective organiza-
tion of any nature. This evil is so wide spread that we
200 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
feel its deleterious effects even in this city. Buffalo,
once numbering some twenty unions, has become sadly
demoralized from this cause, and completely lost to all
union feeling. I am requested by several organizations
of the state to bring this subject to the attention of the
Congress, and request that the jurisdiction of the Na-
tional Labor Union be extended to the British Prov-
inces, with the view of organizing trade and labor
unions. . .
During the past winter much hardship prevailed
among the mechanics and laborers of this state, in con-
sequence of the dullness of trade and the want of em-
ployment, which had a very depressing effect on our
trades' unions. At one time it was estimated that there
were over twenty thousand workingmen unemployed in
this city. With the coming of spring a revival of trade
took place, causing a demand for labor. Our unions
again revived, and many trades demanded a return to
the wages formerly received, which, in most cases, was
acceded to. Some strikes of minor importance took
place, but were of short duration. . .
I regret to report that an obnoxious law has been ex-
humed from the statute books of this state, and brought
to bear against the members of our unions on the charge
of conspiracy. Three such cases are now before the
courts of this state. The first is that of Bricklayers'
Union, No. n, of Morrisania, West Chester County,
which has been decided adverse to the union, and the
members convicted and fined in the sum of fifty dollars
each ; this case has been appealed. The second is that of
Cigar-makers' Union, No. 66, of Kingston, Ulster
County, for conspiracy, to be tried in November. The
third is that of Raybold and Frostevant, self-styled mas-
ter masons, against Samuel R. Gaul, president of the
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 201
Bricklayers' Union, No. 2, and other prominent mem-
bers of the unions of this city, on the charge of conspir-
acy, assessing their damage at ten thousand dollars -
the trial to take place in the Supreme Court. I hope
some action will be had by the Congress to sustain and
assist these associations in testing, even to the highest,
the validity of these charges, and the obnoxious law.
[The vice-president for California, A. M. Keaaday,
reported in part as follows:] My failure to report to
you at the last annual Session of the Labor Congress, the
condition of affairs in California, was owing to the tur-
bulent state of feeling then existing in the ranks of our
party, and the apparent uncertainty of the issue of the
political campaign then progressing. . . But hap-
pily the storm is over, and a retrospective view of the
events discloses the fact that every circumstance, how-
ever threatening in its aspect at the time, was essential
to the glorious victory the movement was destined to
achieve under the guidance of the Divine Spirit "who
doeth all things well." The result of the agitation in
California of the eight hour movement, reveals the cheer-
ing fact that in a little over two years from the time the
subject was first mooted, the entire voting population
of the state, irrespective of party, through their legal
representatives, sanctioned a law which reads as follows:
[It provided for eight hours, "unless otherwise express-
ly stipulated between the parties concerned;" eight
hours in public employment; misdemeanor to require
more than eight hours labor of minor child; exception
of agricultural, vinicultural and horticultural labor.]
Besides the above, a Lien Law and several other acts of
special importance to workingmen, were passed with-
out any serious opposition from any quarter. , But by
far the most important result of this eight hour agita-
202 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
tion-to those who look forward to the day when labor,
organized and effectively drilled, shall assume its legiti-
mate sphere in the body politic -is visible in the marked
improvement in the character of the men engaged in the
movement. A few years ago the working population
of California were in a chaotic state -disorganized, and
at the mercy of capitalists -with very rare exceptions.
To-day, nearly every branch of skilled industry has its
union, fixing its own rate of wages, and regulating its
domestic differences. A spirit of independence, and a
feeling of mutual confidence inspires its members, in
place of the craven fear and mutual distrust which for-
merly animated them. Every organized trade union
in that state which deems it expedient to adopt the eight
hour system, obtains it by the simple passage of a reso-
lution and public notice in the newspapers over the
signatures of their officers, that after a given day they
will demand the enforcement of the law. There is no
strike. Employers accept the notice, and base their
estimates on future contracts upon the new order of
things. Seeing the earnestness which actuates the
workingmen in this movement, our statesmen, divines,
and public writers of every degree, naturally espouse the
cause of labor as the cause of the people, without fear
or dread of being stigmatized as demagogues. . .
[The Treasurer reported receipts, $485; expendi-
tures, $449.57-]
(c) CONSTITUTION
[The following changes were made:] ARTICLE 3.
The officers . . . shall consist of a president [sal-
ary $1,500], first and second vice-president (to be chos-
en from different states), a recording secretary, treas-
urer and an executive committee, consisting of one mem-
ber from each state, such member to be chosen by the
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 203
delegates from their respective states, and the name fur-
nished to the president.
ARTICLED Secti on i. The president . . . dur-
ing the recess [he] shall have power to appoint members
of the Executive Committee in states where they have not
been chosen, and in case of non-performance of duty
shall immediately remove them, and fill all vacan-
cies. . .
ARTICLE 4, Section 5. It shall be the duty of the
Executive Committee to correspond at least once a
month with the president, giving him a synopsis of the
progress of the movement in his state, and that his au-
thority be confined to his own state. They shall have
power to grant charters to organizations in their re-
spective states who have no international or national un-
ions, and shall have power, under the direction of the
president, to organize the workingmen in their respec-
tive states into a Labor Reform Party. Failure on the
part of any member of the Executive Committee to cor-
respond with the president for two months shall be suf-
ficient cause for his removal. The president and secre-
tary of the National Labor Union shall be chairman and
secretary of the Executive Committee. The necessary
expenses incurred by the members of the Executive Com-
mittee in the performance of their duties shall be paid
from the treasury.
ARTICLE 5. Seven members in any labor organization
shall be sufficient to apply for a charter, which shall be
granted on the payment of five dollars. But the Na-
tional Labor Union shall not grant a charter to any
union of the same craft, in any locality where a prior
organization is existing, without the consent of the un-
ion interested.
Many delegates objected strongly to the section as it
204 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
stood, on the ground that if seven members were allowed
to leave any union and form a union for themselves, it
would create great discontent and dissension. Other
delegates contended for it, on the ground that it would
bring in additional revenue to the association. The
section was adopted.
ARTICLE 8. Each local organization represented
shall pay a per capita tax of one cent annually on its
members ; international and national organizations shall
pay a direct tax of fifteen dollars; and state organiza-
tions ten dollars. The tax of all organizations shall be
paid on the presentation of the credentials of the dele-
gates, and no delegate shall be permitted to take any
part in the deliberations of the union until the tax is
paid.
(d) POLITICS
[The Committee on President's Address, Phelps, Vin-
cent, and Cameron, presented the following:] Re-
solved, that in the opinion of your committee the very
existence of the National Labor Union depends upon
the immediate organization of an independent labor
party, having for its object the election of representative
men to our state and national councils -those who are in
direct sympathy and identified with the interests of la-
bor.
[On motion of A. T. Cavis this was amended and
adopted as follows:] Provided, this shall not be un-
derstood as contemplating the nomination of presiden-
tial electors in the states during the pending presidential
campaign.
[By Committee on Female Labor:] RESOLVED, that
the low wages, long hours, and damaging service to
which workingwomen are doomed, destroy health, im-
peril virtue, and are a standing reproach to civilization-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 205
that we urge them to learn trades, engage in business,
join our labor unions, or form protective unions of their
own, secure the ballot, and use every other honorable
means to persuade or force employers to do justice to
women by paying them equal wages for equal work.
RESOLVED, that we pledge the aid of the unions repre-
sented in this congress to all workingwomen's protective
associations, which are now or may be hereafter formed,
in all their just and lawful demands.
RESOLVED, that each delegate to this congress be a
special committee to facilitate the organization of Wo-
men's Labor Associations in their respective localities.
RESOLVED, that this congress demand the application
of the eight-hour law to women's labor in the various
trades and associations in which they are or may be em-
ployed.
RESOLVED, that we urge Congress and all the state
legislatures to pass laws securing equal salaries for equal
work to all women employed under the various depart-
ments of government.
SUSAN B. ANTHONY, EDWARD P. GORDON,
J. W. LE BARNES, WM. J. JESSUP, Committee.
Mr. Keating moved to strike from the first resolution
the words "secure the ballot," which was carried, and
the report adopted as amended.
[Hon. Samuel F. Gary, of the second congressional
district of Ohio, was endorsed for re-election as an ad-
vocate of the principles of the National Labor Union,
and the "action of our fellow-workingmen of said dis-
trict in making him their candidate" was "fully en-
dorsed." The committee on platform, Cameron, Puett^
Stocker, Sylvis, Mrs. Putnam, Mrs. McDonald, Hine,
submitted a report, identical with the platform of 1867,
but with the following additions :]
2 o6 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
RESOLVED, that under a sound monetary system there
could be no antagonism between the interests of the
workingmen and working-women of this country, nor
between any of the branches of productive industry, the
direct operation of each, when not prevented by unjust
monetary laws, being to benefit all the others by the pro-
duction and distribution of the comforts and necessaries
of life; and that the adoption, by the national govern-
ment, of the financial policy set forth in this platform
will put an end to the oppression of workingwomen, and
is the only means of securing to them, as well as to work-
ingmen, the just reward of their labor.
RESOLVED, that we demand the abolishment of the
system of convict labor in our prisons and penitentiaries,
and that the labor performed by convicts shall be that
which will least conflict with honest industry outside of
the prisons, and that the wares manufactured by the con-
victs shall not be put upon the market at less than the
current market rates.
[The minority report, by L. A. Hine, opposed the
currency scheme of the committee, favored gold and
silver, and contended that the real remedy needed was
land limitation. Mr. Hine had been a prominent lec-
turer of the Land Reform Movement of the forties. 23 On
the section relating to strikes, adopted in 1866, the fol-
lowing occurred:]
Mr. Keating, of New York, said there was in the plat-
form a section deprecating strikes. It was well known
that the action of the Congress would have an influence
upon the case of the bricklayers of the State of New
York indicted for conspiracy, and to adopt such a clause
as this would injure their cause. He moved that the
section be stricken out.
23 See volume viii, p. 60.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 207
Miss Susan B. Anthony hoped the motion would not
prevail, and said:
". . . It would be a sad mistake for a labor con-
gress to separate without deprecating strikes, except as
a last resort. In Europe, under monarchical and oli-
garchic governments, workingmen have often no other
possible way to secure their rights ; but here, if working-
men would only break away from their party affiliations,
and use their political power for their own interests,
they could secure all their rights without strikes. (Ap-
plause.) The only reason why workingmen have to
strike in this country is, that they allow themselves to be
the tools of political tricksters. (Applause.) You are
all bound like slaves to one political party or the other,
although you know that both parties are in the service of
the capital of this nation, and that they will never pro-
pose or bring about any measure for workingmen of real
permanent benefit. One party is ruled by Wall Street
gamblers and A. T. Stewart, and the other is the out-
growth of a capital monopoly of which Belmont and
Company are the representatives. Instead of being
afraid that you will injure the cause of workingmen by
passing a clause deprecating strikes, rather set your-
selves earnestly to work to break yourselves and your
constituency away from the enslavement of party pol-
itics. I notice here that the moment any man stands up
to advocate an independent political stand for the work-
ingmen of the country, the cry is raised that he is intro-
ducing politics, but as long as influencing or belonging
to the existing parties is spoken of, no such cry is raised.
Now, you do deprecate strikes, every one deprecates
strikes, just as he deprecates amputations, or any surgical
operation for the remedy of disease ; but that is not deny-
ing that strikes and amputations are sometimes advis-
208 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
able. What you want to remove is that which makes
strikes necessary, and that is subserviency to party of the
workingmen of this country."
Mr. Trevellick said, that, while he perfectly agreed
with the noble lady who had just spoken her views about
strikes, he felt that there was a peculiar reason for strik-
ing out this clause from the platform. He was willing,
for the sake of his fellow-workmen of New York, that
the matter should be omitted from the present platform.
He moved, in view of all the circumstances, that the sec-
tion on strikes be stricken out.
Mr. Keating's amendment prevailed, and the clause
was stricken out. It read as follows :
RESOLVED, that this congress deprecates what is famil-
iarly known as strikes among workingmen, and recom-
mend that every other honorable means be exhausted
before any such course is resorted to.
[Later, the following occurred:] Mrs. Macdonald
obtained the floor, and stated that when that portion of
the platform relating to strikes was stricken out, the
bricklayers of New York were left powerless. She
therefore offered the following:
RESOLVED, that this congress recognizes in its plat-
form the right of the workingmen and workingwomen
of this nation to strike, when all other just and equitable
concessions are refused. Adopted unanimously.
[On the adoption of that part of the platform relating
to national finances, the following is the substance of the
discussion that occurred:] Mr. Fincher said: "I ob-
ject to this measure because it opens the door to specu-
lators wider than they now have it. I speak now of the
passage relative to turning the money into bonds, or the
bonds into money. By such a measure we should give
the bondholders the power of making the amount of
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 209
currency optional with themselves, or they could con-
tract it at any time to answer their own purposes. In my
opinion to give them any such power would be to enable
them to create a panic in this country every three
years, to which the panic of 1867 would be mere child's
play." .
Mr. Fincher then moved to strike out that portion of
the clause in the platform which would give to bond-
holders the privilege of converting bonds into money, or
money into bonds, at pleasure.
Mr. Cameron, of Chicago, said that was the very es-
sence of the whole system of finance proposed by the
committee.
MR. FlNCHER-" We cannot have a gold and silver
currency for many years to come ; we must make use of
paper money for the present. We are all agreed upon
that. The only question is in respect of this matter of
contraction and expansion. This whole theory is based
upon the idea that there is always to be a national debt.
But the debt will be paid off in a few years."
Mr. Hine said . . . "Never in the history of the
world has wealth been so much concentrated in so short
a time as in this country between the years 1 863 and 1 867,
under the inflation to over twenty-eight dollars per head.
The currency of France and England, which the gentle-
man says is so much larger in volume than ours, is a gold
paying currency, and ours must also be redeemable cur-
rency so soon as it can be made so, before we can have a
healthy trade. Gold must for ever be the measure of
value the world over, and we shall trade to disadvantage
with foreign peoples in proportion as our currency shall
be inflated. If gold was $250 when our circulation was
$900,000,000, it will be over $350 should this labor party
inflate it to $1,500,000,000. Government might as well
2 1 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
stamp a bushel of chips and call it wheat, as a piece of
paper and call it money as a measure of values. . ."
MR. TREVELLlCK-"The fault we find with the present
legal tender currency is that it is not made payable for
all import duties. It is a mistake to regard the gold dol-
lar as being money all over the world. It is money just
so long as it is under the American flag; directly it is
landed on the shores of England or France it becomes
bullion. It is money no longer. It is the same with the
gold and silver currency of England. They send over
say 100,000 sterling, stamped with the impress of the
English Government. It is money so long as it is under
the British flag; but directly it is landed here in New
York it becomes bullion. That disposes of the question.
Gold is nothing more than a measure of exchange. A
yard measures the same whether it is a yard of cloth or a
yard of beech wood. The yard-stick is the measure of
exchange ; and so is money; and that is only a local func-
tion. What we mean by inflation is when there is too
large an amount of this measure of exchange floating
about in business. There must always be a sufficient
amount, or business enterprises flag. A sufficient amount
appears to be about thirty-five dollars per capita. France
has that amount, and during the last few years she has
made greater advances than any other nation on the
globe. In America the rate per capita has not increased,
and the small amount of money we have had has re-
tarded our progress. There are but two great maritime
powers in the wo rid -France and England. America
is not one in consequence of not having sufficient money
to carry on our business enterprises. But just so long as
we hold to Mr. Hine's idea, that there is but three thou-
sand million dollars of specie in the world, and that gold
is the only specie, so long we shall enable the few to
I. RlCHARD F. TREVELLICK. Ship-carpenter. President, Ship-carpenters' and
Calkers' International Union, 1865, and president, National Labor Union, 1871-1873.
First great labor agitator. (From tin-type}. 2. WlLLIAM* H. SYLVls. Molder.
President, Iron Molders' International Union, 1863-1869 and of National Labor Union,
1868-1869. First great labor organizer. JONATHAN C. FlNCHER. Machinist.
Secretary, International Union Machinists and Blacksmiths, 1859-1865, and editor
Pinchers Trades* Review (Philadelphia), 1863-1865. 3. AUGUSTA LEWIS (TROUP).
Printer. Organizer in 1868 of first Women's Typographical Union. Corresponding
Secretary in 1870 of International Typographical Union. 4. ALEXANDER TROUP.
Printer. Secretary, National Typographical Union, 1866-1867. Vice-President, National
Labor Union, 1866. Secretary, New York State Workingmen's Assembly, 1869.
Founder New Haven Union, 1871.
NATIONAL LABOR UNION 213
monopolize that money. We must be freed from this
monopoly. The government alone has the right to make
money. Gold and silver is not money after it passes
from under the jurisdiction of the flag that passes it.
It becomes simply bullion, saleable in the markets of the
world as bullion. Money is a legalized agent to repre-
sent values, and does not depend on the intrinsic value
of the material of which it is composed. That being the
case the people must be the masters and not the servants
of money. To make them so we must give the power to
the holder of securities to take the legal money of the
nation or the interest-bearing bonds, reducing the in-
terest by the government to the national increase of the
natural production, which is about three and one-third
per cent, giving the right to reconvert the money into
bonds. If this were done, we should increase the vol-
ume of currency, perhaps, to thirty-five dollars per cap-
ita, which would absorb one-half of the outstanding debt
of the nation, without inflating the currency above the
other nations of the earth. And the increase of the pop-
ulation by emigration and natural causes would absorb
the entire debt of the nation in twenty-five years without
taxing the people one cent. The amount of money would
bear the same proportion to the population by that pe-
riod as thirty dollars per capita does at present."
Mr. Cameron said that, taking three and one-third
per cent as the utmost limit to which the increase by
natural production can be assigned, it would be a ques-
tion how long a nation could go on paying ten per cent
while it is earning only three. We must reduce the rate
of interest. When we come to see this, and act upon it,
we shall not hear of so many men in the City of New
York starving and begging, but there will be work for
all to do.
2i 4 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
MR. FlNCHER-"The fact that I am compelled to de-
fend this side of the question shows what a large amount
of ignorance there is here in regard to financial matters.
Gentlemen talk of our ships being driven from the seas
in consequence of monetary pressure. There seems to
be very little allowance made for the fact that we have
just got through a great war -a struggle to save the life
of this nation. There never was a people who came out
of such a struggle among whom so little real suffering
has been felt as among us. We see workingmen striking
for shorter hours. Why, that fact alone shows that we
are fast recuperating from the effects of the war."
MR. CLARKE -"The gentleman talks about inflating
the currency. But what does the bondholder do when
he wants to convert his money into currency? He
throws the bonds on the market and gets specie instead.
Well, he must do something with his money. He puts
it into the banks which return him a proper rate of in-
terest, because he can't make it remunerative in business.
So it goes right back to the government again; and then
what becomes of your inflation? All this talk about in-
flation is nothing but a myth. It gives the people -the
whole people -power to rule this question of the cur-
rency. . . I say the objection to a gold currency is
that it limits production. Look about you and inquire
who it is that wants to maintain their gold currency.
The merchants cling to it; the bankers cling to it; the
politicians cling to it. I tell you a legalized money sys-
tem is not what they want. But I believe it is what
every laboring man wants. He stands up for his rights
as against the capitalists. The gentleman says we have
gone through the war better than any other nation could
have done. Well, what enabled us to get through the
war? Why, the greenbacks. And we could have gone
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 215
on for twenty years longer, if it had been necessary, upon
the greenback basis. Let us, then, I say, go on and ful-
fill this project of making a real legal money. . ."
MR. BATORY-"The questions are: Shall money be
gold? Shall money be paper? . . . The really im-
portant question is, what interest shall it bear? In Eng-
land gold and silver money is worth only three per cent
to the government. In America it is worth eleven per
cent. Why is this? The government stands as a great
insurance company to the people. It takes the money
of the people upon its own responsibility. You may
talk about inflation of the currency as you like. But if
you inflate it ever so much it does not matter. If an ox
was offered in the market for a penny, and you had not
the money to pay for it, the ox would be of no use to
you. . ."
Mr. McGuire said ". . . In England it costs the
labor of ten men to produce one ton of iron in a day. In
Missouri it costs the labor of eight men to produce a ton
of iron in one day; and the iron is of better quality.
Well, why don't they produce it? Here is Mr. McCar-
thy makes up his mind to go into the iron business, and
he brings thirty or forty families down to Missouri, and
determines to sink one hundred thousand dollars in the
business. When he is about to set to work, the capitalists
say, What are you going to sink all this money in such
a business for?' He replies, 'Because I can get twenty
per cent on my capital.' Then they tell him that he will
have a great deal of labor and trouble to carry on the en-
terprise ; whereas, if he likes, he can get twenty per cent
for his money, with no risk and no trouble at all. So
they persuade Mr. McCarthy to invest half of it in
bonds, which bring him in eight thousand four hundred
dollars, and the other half in a national bank, which
216 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
brings in nine thousand more. . . Those men in
England make iron for us, while we could make better
iron than they, if it were not for the high rates of interest
that money will fetch here. This money should find its
way into business and employment. . ."
MR. FlNCHER-"! am quite sure that if this theory of
converting money into bonds and bonds into money were
carried out it would have very disastrous results upon the
country. It is very likely that some system of converti-
bility will be tried as an experiment, but it is not wise
to commit ourselves without reservation to such a the-
ory." . .
Miss SUSAN B. ANTHONY -"I would be exceedingly
sorry to have it go forth to the world that a Working-
man's Congress could not meet here in New York and
hold a session of a week without being bought up by
Wall Street, as it seems to me would be the case if this
platform was not adopted. . ."
MR. J. C. C. WHALEY-". . . It is by means of
making bonds convertible into money and money into
bonds, at the will of the holder, that we hope to keep
down the system of inflation. When there is too much
money in the market, it will go to the government, and
be converted into bonds. The holders of these bonds,
finding they can get a larger percentage for their bonds
by converting them into money, and in placing them in
commercial enterprises, will do so. This is the key to
the whole question. . . There are three or four men
before the country seeking election to Congress on the
principles of this platform; if you reject the platform
you will injure their cause."
MR. SYLVlS-"Of all the questions that are before the
American people today, there are none so important as
this financial question. I am opposed to changing one
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 217
solitary word in the platform presented here today. The
question seems to be concentrated in that part of the plat-
form looking toward converting bonds into money and
money into bonds. I do not endorse our present green-
back currency. It is not money- it is only a promise to
pay. The beauty of the clause proposed to be struck out
is, that if it once becomes the law of the land, it knocks
the props from every banker and broker in America. It
kills them dead. It favors the people. We never can be
a free people till we get rid of this money power. The
gentleman upon the right, who proposes to strike out this
clause, sees in the plan we are endeavoring to carry out,
a monster with two horns -expansion and contraction -
and he fears that the bankers will seize hold of one or of
the other of the horns and destroy the people. I do not
believe it; because it will kill the bankers entirely.
Under our present monetary system, all the people who
are borrowers must borrow money from bankers or
brokers -money shavers. The people of the United
States are divided into two classes -the skinners and the
skinned -the borrowers being the skinned, and the
bankers the skinners. Now, under the new system pro-
posed, we will borrow money from the Government of
the United States, not from bankers; and we will get it
at one or one and one-half per cent. A bank in any
shape is a licensed swindle; and the greatest swindle
ever imposed upon our people is our present national
banking system. The new system we propose is well en-
titled the American system. One gentleman wants to
know if our money will be taken in England. I do not
care whether it is or not, as long as it is good in my
country. Another gentleman says we have got too much
money. I have not got too much. Has any gentleman
on the floor? We have not got nearly enough money,
2i8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [VoL
and what little we have is gobbled up by a few rich men
in New York and elsewhere. In Pennsylvania and
throughout the country there is not enough money for
the purposes of business, and in the South there is none
at all. The rate of interest we are paying, and always
have paid in this country, is the mill-stone around the
necks of the people. For the last seven years the natural
increase in the wealth of this nation has not been above
three per cent, while the rate of interest on money is
fully fifteen -that is, if it were possible, taking twelve
per cent more than there is. Of course they cannot do
that, but they mortgage our labor in the future ; and so
every ten years the whole machine breaks down. The
labor of the country cannot stand it, and we become a
nation of individual repudiators. I am perfectly satis-
fied that this new financial system is the only salvation
for the working class, to which I belong; and therefore
I am so earnest about it." . .
Mr. Troup moved the previous question, which was
carried. The President decided that the previous ques-
tion cut off all amendments not acted upon, thus requir-
ing the convention to vote upon the matter as reported
from the committee. On an appeal being taken from
the decision of the chair, the latter was sustained. The
report of the committee on platform was then adopted
as a whole.
[The following was adopted, on motion of Wallace :]
RESOLVED, that there be a committee of five appointed
from the representatives of each state, styled an Exec-
utive Committee, with power to organize their respec-
tive states into a Labor Party. Second -Resolved, that
these committees have power to frame laws to govern
the action of said party, and make rules for the proper
discipline of the same ; and that this union recommend
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 219
the workingmen of the United States to immediately
organize their respective legislative and congressional
districts under the same, and place their candidates in
the field, and to use their utmost efforts to elect them.
Third -Resolved, that wherever there is a candidate al-
ready in the field standing on the labor platform of the
union, it shall be the duty of the Executive Committee
to render them all the aid and support in their power,
and use all honorable means to secure their election.
[Communications were received as follows: from the
Newark House Painters' Union, withdrawing their del-
egate, Mr. John Pateman, from the Congress, in con-
sequence of the admission of Mrs. Elizabeth Cady
Stanton; from Mr. Ignatius Batory, tendering his resig-
nation as a delegate to the congress, in consequence of the
resolution adopted in regard to the' formation of a Labor
Reform Party.]
(e) CO-OPERATION
[By Committee on Co-operation:] RESOLVED, that we
recognize in the idea and principle of co-operation, as
applied to the various branches of industry, in whatever
shape it may be applied, one of the most powerful agents
for the elevation of labor, and the equitable distribution
of wealth among those who produce it; that we look
with pleasure upon the efforts now being made to estab-
lish co-operation in every branch of productive labor,
and we believe that when the principle of co-operation
is universally recognized by all the trades and callings,
and put into practical operation, these unfortunate and
unprofitable contests between capital and labor, called
strikes or "lock-outs," will disappear from society, and
labor find its just and true position.
RESOLVED, that we recommend to each labor organiza-
tion, of whatever name or calling, male or female, the
220 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
practical adoption and application of the principle of
co-operation.
JOHN O'DoNAGHUE, AARON W. STOCKTON,
JOHN E. MUSSELMAN, Committee.
Mr. Keating objected to the language in the report
relative to strikes, and argued in favor of their legiti-
macy.
Mr. Sylvis was in favor of the report as read, and
thought that strikes were a necessary evil, but were a
valuable school to the workingmen. He favored with
all his heart the idea of co-operation among the indus-
trial classes, and argued that this principle was fully
understood by the workingmen. Strikes would be dis-
pensed with, and the profits now pocketed by the capital-
ists would be divided among the producers.
The debate was participated in by Messrs. Hine,
McKechnie, Ennis and others, including Mr. Batory,
who offered the following as an amendment:
RESOLVED, also, that whenever the working and all
other classes whose interests are identical shall succeed
in assuming the management of the legislature of the
country, and are enabled to repeal the partial laws and
enact laws that are impartial in their effect, the necessity
for co-operation against combination will cease.
Mr. Batory in his remarks stated that the strike of the
New York bricklayers had cost the various Trades'
Unions so much money, it was feared that many of them
would be broken up. . .
Mr. Walsh claimed that the bricklayers of New York
were the instrument through which the workingmen of
the state would abolish the obnoxious conspiracy law
which had just come to light on the statute book. He
denied the statement of Mr. B., and claimed, as the re-
sult of a four months' strike, that there were now over
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 221
fifteen hundred bricklayers working eight hours per day
in the city, and that, notwithstanding the statements of
the bosses, it was not true that they (the bosses) had all
the ten hour men they needed. He wished the yeas and
nays called, to find whether the convention would bear
the previous speaker out in his statement relative to the
demoralization caused by the money contributed to the
support of the bricklayers.
[The Convention adjourned for the day, but before
final adjournment of the congress a motion by Walsh
prevailed, "that so much as made mention of strikes be
omitted from the report," and the report, thus amended,
was adopted.]
(f) PROTECTION AND IMMIGRATION
[By Mr. Cavis] WHEREAS, Cqngress and the politi-
cal parties of the United States favor the policy of pro-
tecting American industry by duties on imports; and
whereas, Congress and the state legislatures have, by
legislation, encouraged the introduction of foreign labor
into the industries of the country, which labor, when
brought here, comes into direct competition with Amer-
ican labor, whose protection is the avowed policy of the
government: And whereas, federal and state legislation
has chartered companies to procure immigrants, and
Congress has donated large bodies of public lands to
such companies, therefore
RESOLVED, that Congress has no constitutional power
to protect industrial investments at the expense of oper-
ative labor.
RESOLVED, that the chartering of immigrant com-
panies is a direct attempt to control the price of home
labor, and is hereby reprobated and denounced.
RESOLVED, that Congress is invested with no 'authority
222 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
to bestow the public lands upon private corporations,
particularly when such corporations use their franchises
to bring the cheap labor of Europe into competition
with the dearer labor of the United States.
Mr. Fincher moved the adoption of the resolutions
as read. Carried. . .
[At a later session the following communication was
read, and referred to the President with power:]
To THE OFFICERS AND MEMBERS of the National La-
bor Union: Acting under instructions from the honor-
able body I have the honor to represent, I would most
respectfully call your attention to the following pre-
amble and resolutions :
WHEREAS, the present military laws of Germany and
France, requiring young men to serve an enlistment in
the army when they arrive at the age of twenty-one
years, coupled with the present state of political affairs,
brought on by the unwise action of the despotic rulers of
Europe, is at present filling our seaport towns with
skilled mechanics and artizans, who do not understand
the language of the country, and are wilfully imposed
upon by agents of the "Emigrant Aid Society," which
we all know is a machine run by capitalists. These men,
when they arrive, as a general rule, have but little
money; consequently they are compelled to work at
starvation prices, when they can get work, which is
sometimes no easy matter, as you are very well aware
that we stand no chance of competing with these men, if
common humanity did not require us to take some action
in the matter; be it therefore
RESOLVED, that the officers of this body be appointed
a committee for the purpose of adopting the necessary
measures to have the charter, now held by the "American
Emigrant Society" from the United States, revoked;
and be it further
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 223
RESOLVED, that the said committee also take the neces-
sary steps, by correspondence, or organs printed in the
various European languages, to have the laborers of
Europe posted on our positions in relation to them.
HENRY B. MULHALL
Delegate from the New York State Trades' Assembly.
The President, retiring from the chair, read from the
New York Herald an article on the "Emigrant Aid So-
ciety/' and characterized the institution as one of the
most infamous on the continent. Mr. J. C. C. Whaley
corroborated the remarks of President Sylvis, and urged
the repeal of its charter. . .
[By Mr. Schuck] WHEREAS, the Labor Congress
now in session have, by resolutions, requested the United
States Congress to rescind the charter of the "Emigrant
Society," in the hands of capitalists^ and whereas, a Ger-
man journal of this city has had the effrontery to slander
the German delegates in this convention, in consequence
of their support of the resolution, and has ignored the
real tendency of the same ; be it therefore
RESOLVED, that we, the German delegates of this con-
gress, do solemnly protest against the assertions and in-
sinuations of said journal, as we well know, without the
advice of said journal, what is beneficial for ourselves
and the workingmen of America. [Adopted.]
(g) ACCIDENTS
We, the undersigned, your committee appointed to
consider the subject relative to the danger and destruc-
tion of human life which frequently occurs during the
erection of buildings, and various other mechanical
structures, do hereby respectfully submit the following
report, viz: Whereas, it is a notorious fact that fatal
so-called accidents have frequently occurred tfirough a
culpable, if not criminal, disregard or neglect of em-
224 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
ployers generally for the protection of human life dur-
ing the erection of buildings and other mechanical op-
erations. Therefore, we earnestly recommend that the
various state legislatures of this nation would pass a law
that would hold liable said employers; if they are not
responsible, hold liable the owners of the property on
which any such accident may occur; providing such ac-
cident can be proved to be a disregard or neglect of such
employers or owners.
PATRICK WALSH, THOMAS J. WALSH,
JOHN McHOES, Committee.
Mr. Fincher moved to amend by inserting after
"buildings" the words "working mines," which was
agreed to. Mr. E. L. Roseman moved to include streets
and wharves, which was lost, and the report was adopted.
(h) DEPARTMENT OF LABOR AND CENSUS
STATISTICS
[By Mr. Sylvis] WHEREAS, in looking out over so-
ciety, we find the protecting arm of the law thrown
around every enterprise having for its object the accum-
ulation of wealth, and the utmost care taken to foster
and encourage the undertakings of the rich, and to assist
capital in all monopolies ; and whereas, we find, as a part
of our government at Washington, a Department of
State, of War, of the Navy, of the Interior, of Finances,
and others of a similar character, all supposed to be for
the benefit of all the people, but sadly prostituted in their
administration, and used almost exclusively for further-
ing the projects of the rich and powerful of the land;
and whereas, there is no department of our government
having for its sole object the care and protection of la-
bor, and the various enterprises and undertakings of
workingmen, having for their object an equitable dis-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 225
tribution of the products of industry, and the elevation
of those who labor; therefore be it
RESOLVED, that the president of this body, and four
others to be appointed, shall constitute a committee, who
shall prepare a petition, to be by them presented to Con-
gress, asking the creation of a new department at Wash-
ington, to be called a "Department of Labor;" said de-
partment to have charge, under the laws of Congress, of
the distribution of the public domain, the registration
and regulation, under a general system, of trade unions,
co-operative associations, and all other organizations of
workingmen and women having for their object the pro-
tection of productive industry, and the elevation of those
who toil.
RESOLVED, that said committee shall prepare a peti-
tion, to be circulated among the working people of the
country for signatures, asking for such a department;
and that said committee shall take whatever steps may
be in their opinion necessary to secure the objects herein
set forth.
Mr. Keating moved that the resolutions be referred to
the committee on public domain.
Mr. Sylvis said he did not wish the subject burlesqued.
It was, in his opinion, a very important matter; and he
had studied it for years. We were fifty years behind
Prussia, which nation had a labor department in its gov-
ernment, presided over by one of the ablest men of the
day. There the working class has the arm of govern-
ment thrown around it, and is properly protected. In
this country of ballots and spread-eagles, when we ask
anything of Congress we are laughed at. He did not
purpose to be laughed at any longer, and declared him-
self an enemy to every man who is against the class to
which he (Mr. S.) belonged.
226 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Mr. Fincher seconded the resolutions, in a few re-
marks, and they were adopted unanimously.
[By L. A. Hine] WHEREAS, statistics officially col-
lected are indispensable to the studies of the statesman ;
that as far as our present official reports give the facts,
it is easier to tell how many horses are well stabled than
how many families are well housed -easy to find out all
that concerns the capitalist, but difficult to discover the
actual condition of the great mass of the people; there-
fore,
RESOLVED, that we respectfully request Congress to
provide in the act for taking the approaching census, for
a thorough inquiry to be made into the facts that concern
the whole people ; as, for example, a classification of the
distribution of wealth and incomes, the number engaged
in the several avocations, together with the wages, sal-
aries and profits received therein; also, facts as to the
employment of women, and the remuneration received
by them; also, how many families occupy their own
homes, and how the soil is divided among the people,
how many own the real estate in cities, and what amounts
the several classes of monopolists own ; how many farms
there are of fifty acres and under; how many between
50 and 100 acres, between 100 and 200 acres, between
200 and 500 acres, and how many have over 500 and
under 1,000 acres; also how much land is held by indi-
viduals above 100 acres, and how much by non-residents,
together with such further facts as the Congress may
perceive to be necessary to a thorough comprehension of
the condition of the people. Adopted.
(i) MISCELLANEOUS RESOLUTIONS - OFFICERS
[Other resolutions were adopted as follows: recom-
mending A New Monetary System, by the late Edward
Kellogg and a work by Hon. Alex. Campbell of La
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 227
Salle, Illinois, on finance; adopting the Workingmaris
Advocate of Chicago and the Arbelter Union of New
York as national labor organs, and recognizing the Rev-
olution, edited by Susan B. Anthony as "an able and well
conducted advocate of our principles," and entitled to
"full and impartial support;" providing for the draft
of a uniform apprentice law; asking that the bankruptcy
law be amended so as to give wages, in full, the first
claim on the assets; urging repeal of "all common or
statute laws justifying criminal prosecution of working-
men as conspirators for peacefully defending their trade
rights," and calling on unions for the means necessary
to defend suits; disapproving of the delays in civil courts
in proceedings of suits for salary; appointing a commit-
tee to wait on the attorney-general of the United States
and secure his official construction of the Eight-hour
Law ; rejoicing in the abolition of slavery, urging the res-
toration of the Southern States and inviting "the work-
ing classes of the South to join with us in the movement
we have undertaken ;" thanking Richard Trevellick "for
his indefatigable exertions during the past four years;"
thanking Miss Kate Mullaney, "Chief Directrix" of the
Collar Laundry Workingwomen's Association of Troy,
New York, "for her indefatigable exertions in the inter-
ests of workingwomen ;" supporting the bricklayers on
strike in New York for eight hours, and endorsing the
New York Sun and Star for their support of the brick-
layers; and a resolution introduced by a Coopers' dele-
gate condemning "the wide-spread use of old, dirty, and
infected barrels, by manufacturers and dealers, in pack-
ing flour, meal and sugars." Officers elected : president,
Wm. H. Sylvis; first vice-president, C. H. Lucker; sec-
ond vice-president, A. T. Cavis; recording secretary,
John Vincent; treasurer, A. W. Phelps.]
5. PHILADELPHIA CONGRESS, AUGUST
16-23, 1869
(a) DELEGATES
Workingman's Advocate, Sept. 4, 1869.
INTERNATIONAL AND NATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS-}.
F. Myers, Iron Moulders' International and Coopera-
tive, and Protective Union ; W. A. Shields, John Dunn,
James Beatty, International Typographical Union; A.
W. Phelps, E. L. Roseman, National Carpenters' and
Joiners' Union ; O. B. Daly, president International Ma-
chinists' and Blacksmiths' Union.
STATE ORGANIZATIONS -Fred. Baker and John Hihn,
Grand Lodge, Knights of St. Crispin, Pa.; Peter P.
Brown and R. M. Ager, United Hod Carriers' and La-
borers' Association, Pa.; Otto Kirsch, Fred. Lyder,
Central Labor Union, Pa. ; Hugh Cameron and
Dunlap, State Labor Union, Kansas.
MASSACHUSETTS -S. P. Cummings, Putnam League,
No. 42, Knights of St. Crispin, Danvers; Martha M.
Wallbridge, Excelsior League, No. 3, Stoneham;
Charles McLean, Labor Reform Institute, Boston; S.
B. Pratt, Labor Reform League, Worcester; E. B. Law-
ton, Boatbuilders' and Sparmakers' Union, Charles-
town; David Powers, Workingmen's Association,
Springfield; Leonard C. Segus, Unity League, No. 3,
Knights of St. Crispin, Lynn.
CONNECTICUT -Joseph H. Powell, Mechanics' Pro-
tective Union, Bridgeport; Albert R. Harrison, Citi-
zens' Labor League, New Haven.
NEW YORK-W. J. Jessup, Workingmen's Union,
NATIONAL LABOR UNION 229
New York City; Conrad Kuhn, Cigarmakers' Union,
No. 90; M. R. Walsh, Typographical Union, No. 6;
Fred Peyer, Framers' Union; Fred. Hik, German Oak
Lodge, No. 142, Knights of St. Crispin; Simon Shuck,
German Varnishers' Association; James Carr, Iron
Moulders' Union, No. 25, John M. Bassong, Carvers'
Association; Fred Tourelle, Barbers' Union; Wm. Mc-
Phail, Mutual Benefit and Protective Society of Opera-
tive Painters; Wm. Gudenrath, Machinists' and Metal
Workers' Union; S. Mayer, Tailors' Union, No. i, and
Labour Union, No. 5; Edmund Gridley, Carpenters'
and Joiners' Union, No. 5, [and?] Knights of St. Cris-
pin ; W. C. Tucker, Journeymen Tailors' Protective and
Benefit Union; Peter J. Meaney, Iron Moulders' Union,
No. 96; Fk. Homringhausen, United Cabinet Makers'
Union ; Jacob Stoft, Cigarmakers' Union, No. 97, Brook-
lyn; Henry Stumpf, Tailors' Union, No. 2, Brooklyn;
Nathaniel Gillard, Workingmen's Association of Mon-
roe County, Rochester ; W. Wilkins, Knights of St. Cris-
pin.
NEW JERSEY- Wm. Manks, League No. 2, Druggist
Glass Blowers' Union, Melville; John H. Jones, Labor
Union, Camden; John L. Sharp, Labor Union, No. i,
Melville.
PENNSYLVANIA -H. G. Neil, Ironmoulders' Union,
No. i, Philadelphia; John H. Thomas, United Hod-
carriers' Union; Earnest Louis, Mechanics' Associa-
tion; Hugh Bryson, Philadelphia Lodge, No. 121,
Knights of St. Crispin; Wm. H. Wheller, Carpenters'
and Joiners' Union, No. 89.
PROGRESSIVE REFORM ASSOCIATIONS -James Roane,
United Hod Carriers' Union, No. 2; James W. McCor-
mic, Journeymen Plumbers' Union; Philip Kebscher,
German Garment Cutters' Association; Francis Snyder,
2 3 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Silk Weavers' and Tassel Makers' M. H. Society;
Englebert Grudell, United Cabinetmakers' Union; Ed.
M. Davis, Chelton Hill, Millstown, Protective Associa-
tion; Wm. J. McCarty, Engineers' P. Union, St. Clair;
W. J. Dunlap, Ironmoulders' Union, No. 32, Lawrence-
ville; James C. Sylvis, Labor Union, Sunbury.
MARYLAND- Hugh Potter, Journeymen Oak Coopers'
Union, No. 2, Baltimore; Michael McMahon, Iron-
moulders' Union, No. 19, Baltimore; Patrick Regney,
Ironmoulders' Union, No. 24; Aaron W. Stockton, Ship
Joiners' Union; Chas. Luke, Journeymen Coopers' Un-
ion, No. i ; Thos. Cullington, Cigarmakers' Union, No.
i ; Robert H. Butler (colored), Engineers' Association;
Isaac Myers, Caulkers' Trade Union Society; Ignatius
Batory, Moulders' Union Society; James W. W. Hare,
Printers' Society; A. T. Cavis, Workingmen's Assem-
bly, Washington, D.C.; W. H. Stywold, Ironmoulders'
Union, No. 128, Richmond.
TENNESSEE -Henry N. Cramer, Labor Union, No.
i, Nashville; John Gunn, Ironmoulders' Union, No.
205, Knoxville; Wm. Black, Ironmoulders' Union, No.
55, Nashville; Thomas Moffett, Ironmoulders' Union,
No. 66.
MISSISSIPPI -H. C. Goode, Machinists' and Black-
smiths' Union, No. i, Water Valley ; A. W. West, Labor
Union, No. i, Water Valley; Hal. T. Walker, Iron-
moulders' Union, No. 154, Mobile, [Alabama] ; C. Ben
Johnson, Ironmoulders' Union, No. 174, Columbus,
[Georgia.]
[ILLINOIS] -William Cogswell, Ironmoulders' Un-
ion, No. 192, Ottawa; Alexander Campbell, Labor Un-
ion, No. , Eden, La Salle County; A. C. Cameron,
Bricklayers' Union, No. 2, Chicago; Fred Retz, Ger-
man Workingmen's Central Protective and Benefit So-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 23 1
ciety, Chicago; W. H. Clark, Labor Union, No. 2,
Lostant; George Keen, Labor Union, Nos. i and 2,
McGregor, [Iowa] ; R. Trevellick, Harnessmakers'
Union, Detroit, [Michigan] ; Moses W. Field, Labor
Union, No. i, Detroit, [Michigan].
MISSOURI -H. O. Sheldon [Ohio?].
PENNSYLVANIA-}. M. Williams, General Council of
the Miners and Laborers, Tamaqua; Isaac C. Weiss,
Workingmen's Union, Philadelphia.
WISCONSIN -Joseph C. Storey, Laborers' Union, No.
i, Black River Falls ; L. DeWolf, Ironmoulders' Union,
No. 125, Milwaukee.
NEBRASKA -Clinton Briggs, Laborers' Union, No. i,
Omaha.
A. M. Winn, Mechanics' State Council, San Fran-
cisco, Cal.; J. B. Haney, Grand Rapids, Mich.
[Objection was made by Walsh, of the Typographical
Union, to the admission of Susan B. Anthony on the
ground that the Workingwomen's Protective Associa-
tion, of which she was president, was not a bona-fide
labor organization; and that she had striven to procure
situations for girls from which the men had been dis-
charged, at lower wages than the men received. Her
admission was favored by Puett, Trevellick, McLean,
Cameron, Miss Wallbridge, Cummings, and opposed
by Walsh, Kuhn, West, Daly. Several others spoke on
the subject, including Miss Anthony, and finally her
credentials and fee were returned to her on a vote of
sixty-three yeas and twenty-eight nays. The name of
"Mr. West, from the political association of New York"
was objected to, but afterwards accepted.]
[After prayer by Rev. John Kemp, of Philadelphia,
and an eulogy on the late president, William H. Sylvis,
delivered by Cameron, the incomplete president's ad-
2 3 2 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
dress prepared by Sylvis was read, showing that he had
opened extensive correspondence, distributed circulars,
and appointed a committee of five to reside in Washing-
ton during the session of Congress; he also stated that
the speeches by Samuel F. Gary, Benjamin F. Butler,
and Senator Sprague had aroused the attention of the
whole country to the measures of the National Labor
Congress. President Lucker spoke of the revival of
the conspiracy laws; the imprisonment of two men in
Schuylkill county, Pennsylvania, "simply because they
were members of a workingmen's union;" the progress
of eight-hour legislation ; the revival of the coolie trade ;
the failure of cooperation to take "that hold among the
producers that their importance entitles them to;" he
endorsed the formation of a National Labor Party, "to
capture Washington, not with bullets, but with ballots,
in 1872;" recommended the appointment of a delegate
to the international congress at Basle; and reported the
following charters issued by the National Labor Union,
given in the order granted:]
No. i, of Wisconsin, at Black River Falls; No. i, of
Pennsylvania, Eastern; No. i, of Iowa, McGregor; No.
i, of Tennessee, Nashville; No. i, of Illinois, Chicago;
No. i, of New York (city), cigar-makers; No. 2, of
Pennsylvania, Williamsport; No. i, of Ohio, Salem;
No. 2, of New York, Verplanck's Point; No. 2, of Ohio,
Painesville; No. 3, of New York City; No. i, of New
Jersey, Millville; No. 2, of Illinois, Lostant; No. i,
North Carolina, Wilmington; No. 4, New York, Hav-
erstraw; No. i, of Nebraska, Omaha; No. 2, of Neb-
raska, Omaha (Scandinavian) ; No. 5, of New York,
New York City; No. 2, of Iowa, McGregor; No. i, of
Georgia, Atlanta; No. i, of Mississippi, Water Valley;
No. 6, of New York (city) ; No. 2, of Wisconsin, Mil-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 233
waukee; No. 7, of New York, Peekskill; No. 3, of Illi-
nois, Ottawa; No. i, of Kansas, Leavenworth, and No.
4, of Illinois, .
(b) "PLATFORM OF THE LABOR REFORM PARTY"
Workingman's Advocate, Sept. n, 1869, p. 4, col. 3.
[The platform adopted by the convention of 1869
contained, beside the resolutions quoted below, the fol-
lowing which were identical with those of previous
years: recommending working men to proceed to the
public lands (1866) ; improved dwellings (1866, 1867,
1868) ; preference for working men in public office
(1867, 1868); contract labor in prisons and peniten-
tiaries (1868). The resolution adopted with reference
to the protection of women wage-earners was substan-
tially the same as those of 1866, i867,<and 1868; and that
concerning the establishment of lyceums, mechanics' in-
stitutes, and reading-rooms was very similar to those of
1 867 and 1868.]
WHEREAS, it is not deemed advisable to change or
modify the existing declaration of principles, but to re-
affirm the same, and for practical use enunciate the sub-
stance thereof in a more convenient and concise form,
with some additional resolutions; and,
WHEREAS, all political power is inherent in the peo-
ple, and free government founded on their authority and
established for their benefit; that all free men are equal
in political rights, and entitled to the largest political
and religious liberty compatible with good order of so-
ciety, as also the use and enjoyment of the fruits of their
labor, and talents and no man or set of men are entitled
to exclusive, separate emoluments, privileges or immuni-
ties from the government but in consideration of public
service; and any laws destructive of these fundamental
234 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
principles are without moral binding force, and should
be repealed. To do so, however, is a difficult work,
when such laws or usages are interwoven with pride,
prejudices and selfishness. Besides, experience shows
that laboring people are, more than others, disposed to
suffer while evils are sufferable, than to organize for
their abolition, and,
WHEREAS, we are admonished by the imperilled
rights of labor throughout the United States to organize
and agitate in our own behalf with the decree, "in the
sweat of the face shalt thou eat bread," and the adage
that "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance," en-
throned in our hearts and emblazoned as mottoes on our
banners, assured of success over corrupt political
schemes and the speculators and banker who are prey-
ing like harpies upon the fruits of honest labor, and thus
restore to our political and social system that equilibrium
of rights and justice so necessary to good government
and domestic tranquillity; therefore, be it
RESOLVED, that laborers in all departments of useful
industry are suffering from a system of monetary laws
which were enacted during the late war, as measures, it
was assumed necessary to the life of the nation, and
which is now sought to be perpetuated in the interest of
bondholders and bankers as a means to subvert the gov-
ernment of our fathers, and establish on its ruins an em-
pire, in which all political power shall be centralized
to restrain and oppress the rights of labor, and sub-
ordinate its votaries to the merciless demands of ag-
gregated capital and supercilious authority.
RESOLVED, that the national banking system, being in-
imical to the spirit of liberty, and subversive of the prin-
ciples of justice and without warrant in the constitution
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 235
of the United States, and wrongfully increasing the bur-
dens of the wealth-producing classes millions of dollars
annually, justice, the aspirations of honest industry, and
the spirit of imperilled liberty demand its immediate re-
peal and the substitution of legal tender notes as the ex-
clusive currency of the nation.
RESOLVED, that the "National Labor Union" is op-
posed to the continuation and creation of banks by acts
of incorporation, by either state or national authority,
with the privilege of making, issuing, or putting in cir-
culation, any notes, bills or other paper of any other
bank to circulate as money, except the "legal-tender
treasury notes" therein contemplated.
RESOLVED, that the present rate of interest is in excess
of and disproportionate to the increase of national
wealth, and being the governing power in the distribu-
tion of the products of capital and labor, is oppressive
to the producing classes.
RESOLVED, that the revenue laws of the United States
should be altered so that, instead of subordinating labor
to capital, they may afford just protection to labor and
the industrial interests of the whole country.
RESOLVED, that the legal-tender money should be made
a legal-tender in the payment of all debts, public and
private, and convertible at the option of the holder into
government bonds, bearing interest at the rate of three
per cent per annum, with privilege to the holder to re-
convert the bonds into money or the money into bonds, at
pleasure.
RESOLVED, that the claim of the bondholders, that the
bonds which were bought with greenbacks, and the prin-
cipal of which is by law payable in currency, should
nevertheless be paid in gold, is unjust and extortionate.
2 3 6 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
RESOLVED, that the exemption from tax of bonds and
securities, is a violation of the just principal of revenue
laws.
RESOLVED, that land monopolies are at variance with
the doctrine that "all freemen when they form a social
compact are equal in rights," and if persisted in, must
ultimately result in the subversion of free institutions,
as also the social and political well-being of the laboring
masses. To prevent this calamity, the public lands
adapted to agriculture should be given, in reasonable
quantities, to none but American citizens, and such as
have declared their intention to become citizens. In-
dividual owners of extensive tracts of land should be en-
couraged to dispose of the same in small parcels, at rea-
sonable prices, to actual settlers, that may thus become
identified with the soil, as responsible, intelligent citi-
zens. . .
RESOLVED, that as labor is the foundation and cause
of national prosperity, it is both the duty and interest of
government to foster and protect it. Its importance,
therefore, demands the creation of an Executive De-
partment of the government at Washington, to be de-
nominated the Department of Labor, which shall aid
in protecting it above all other interests.
RESOLVED, that the protection of life, liberty, and
property, are the three cardinal principles of govern-
ment, and the two first more sacred than the latter ; there-
fore, money necessary for prosecuting wars should, as it
is required, be assessed and collected from the wealth of
the country, and not be entailed as a burden on posterity.
RESOLVED, that the National Labor Congress earnest-
ly recommends the adoption of such measures among all
classes of workmen, in all sections of the country, as will
secure the adoption of the eight hour system, and calls
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 237
upon the respective state legislatures to follow the ex-
ample of the national Congress, in recognizing eight
hours as a legal day's work.
RESOLVED, that voluntary associations of workingmen
and women are entitled, at the hands of legislation, state
and national, to the same chartered rights and privileges
granted to associated capital, and we demand their prac-
tical recognition and enforcement.
RESOLVED, that political equality being one of the car-
dinal principles of this organization, we therefore urge
full restoration of civil rights to every American citizen,
except such as have been convicted of felony.
RESOLVED, that we are unalterably opposed to the im-
portation of a servile race for the sole and only purpose
of pauperising the labor of the American working-
men. . .
RESOLVED, that we demand the rigid enforcement of
the law of Congress of i86i, 24 prohibiting coolie impor-
tation. . .
[The constitution was not changed at this session, but
the president was authorized to appoint a committee on
ways and means, and a standing Executive Advisory
Committee of five to serve until the next Congress, and
to prepare an address to the people of the United States.]
(c) RESOLUTIONS AND OFFICERS
(i) Hours of Labor.
Workingman's Advocate, Sept. 4, 1869, p. 2, col. 4.
Mr. Kuhn, of New York, offered and read the follow-
ing:
RESOLVED, that the president in conjunction with the
Executive Committee, be required to draft an exact and
specified plan, according to which all trades unions of a
24 This law was not enacted until 1862.- EDS.
238 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
state have to act unitedly, for the purpose of availing
themselves of all proper means for the enforcement of an
eight-hour law of their state, which shall be binding on
any craft, and in which law the punishment for its viola-
tion shall be stipulated, the following features of the
plan being proposed :
1. All trades unions to endeavor to abolish piece work,
and to introduce day's work.
2. The trades' unions of every state to centralize them-
selves.
3. The state in which the centralization of the trades'
unions has made the greatest progress will take the lead
by practical actions, and should be supported materially
by the other states.
4. As soon as the proper time has arrived labor shall
be stopped at the same time and simultaneously in all
trades of a state, in order to enforce the eight-hour law.
This was amended by striking out the words "piece-
work," and making it read, "that we abolish piece work
whenever it is practicable."
(2) Conspiracy Laws.
Workingman's Advocate, Sept. 4, 1869, p. 2, col. 4.
[By committee on obnoxious laws] WHEREAS, there
exists on the statutes of the several states, enactments
making it a penal offence for the American mechanic
and laborer to combine for self-protection to secure his
inalienable rights, a fair day's wages for a fair day's
work; and whereas, such laws have been passed exclu-
sively in the interest and for the benefit of the capitalist,
antagonistic to the spirit of American liberty; and
whereas, there is no redress for the mechanic or laborer
in the State of Pennsylvania to make an appeal, if in his
judgment he thinks he is unjustly tried and convicted
under this tyrannical law; therefore,
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 239
RESOLVED, the workingmen of the United States em-
phatically demand their unconditional repeal.
WM. J. MCCARTY, THOS. CULLINGTON, WM. RAY.
Agreed to.
[By Wm. J. McCarty of Pennsylvania] RESOLVED,
that a committee of one from each state be appointed to
wait upon the legislatures of the several states to recom-
mend the repeal of all laws injurious to the working-
classes of the respective states, and each committee re-
port to the next general congress of the National Labor
Union what are the most obnoxious laws in their re-
spective states. Agreed to.
(3) Southern Labor.
Workingman's Advocate, Sept. 4, 1869, p. 2, col. 6.
[By Mr. Horace Day, of New York] RESOLVED,
that the National Labor Union knows no north, no
south, no east, no west, neither color nor sex, on the
question of rights of labor, and urge our colored fellow
members to form organizations in all legitimate ways,
and send their delegates from every state in the union to
the next congress. Agreed to.
Mr. Walker, of Alabama, asked leave to address the
congress briefly. He then eloquently thanked the con-
gress in behalf of the South for the generous, brotherly,
and thoroughly patriotic position which it had assumed
toward that portion of the country, and predicted the
excellent effect which its action would have in helping
to heal the soreness which still exists between the differ-
ent sections of the country.
In response to a general call, Gen. West of Mississippi
also addressed the Congress in the same strain.
Mr. Robert H. Butler (colored), of Maryland, in be-
half of the colored delegates, also returned thanks for
their reception. He said they did not come seeking for
2 4 Q AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
parlor sociabilities, but for the rights of manhood. (Ap-
plause.) He deprecated the coolie trade. . .
[By Mr. Wilkins, of New York] RESOLVED, that R.
M. Adger, Peter H. Brown, John H. Thomas, James
Roane and Robert Butler be appointed a committee to
organize the colored working men of Pennsylvania into
labor unions, with instructions to report progress to the
president of the International Labor Congress, at the
next session thereof. Agreed to.
(4) Labor Statistics.
Working-man's Advocate, Sept. 4, 1869, P- 2 > co '- 4-
Mr. Kuhn (NT.), in behalf of the New York Ger-
man Labor Union, offered the following:
RESOLVED, that it shall be the duty of each labor or-
ganization to reply quarterly to the following ques-
tions: i. The names of the labor union. 2. The num-
ber of their members. 3. How many are their usual
hours of daily labor? 4. What is the usual amount of
their wages? 5. What is the average of their cost of
living? 6. Have they steady or unsteady work? 7.
How many of them have been out of employment for
the last three months? 8. Are those that have work
fully employed? 9. Has there been a rise or fall in their
wages during the last five years? 10. How many mem-
bers have been prevented from working on account of
sickness during the last three months and how many
have died? n. Have they tried co-operative produc-
tion, and what is the result? Aside from giving these
answers, it is left to the choice of every trades union to
add any other interesting or important facts. After
much debate the above was adopted. . .
[By A. T. Cavis] RESOLVED, that it shall be the duty
of the committee on labor department, with the co-
operation of the president, to cause to be prepared a
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 241
series of questions designed to gather statistics during
the taking of the census of 1870, stating the cost of pro-
duction in all departments of industry, the cost of trans-
portation thereon to market, classification of the modes
of conveyance, the cost when put upon the market, and
the prices paid by the consumers or at the point of ex-
port, and press their adoption upon the congress of the
United States through the census committee. [Adopt-
ed.]
[Resolutions were also adopted as follows: appoint-
ing a committee to appeal for funds, one-half of which
should go to erect a monument to William H. Sylvis
and one-half "to the maintenance of his wife and chil-
dren and the education of the latter;" directing the
president to address a circular to all labor organizations
asking for a contribution of five cents a member to pay
the president's salary and expenses ; electing A. C. Cam-
eron delegate and C. H. Lucker associate delegate to
the International Congress at Basle, Switzerland; ex-
pressing thanks due to Peter Cooper for his "well-timed
defence of our American monetary system;" advocating
exemption from taxation of those not owning "surplus
property beyond what is necessary to support and ed-
ucate a citizen's family;" defending the locked-out
miners of Pennsylvania and charging the mining mon-
opolies, transportation monopolies and city speculators
as responsible for the high prices of coal.
[Reports of committees not acted upon were referred
to committee on platform; strongly re-affirming the im-
portance of cooperation; opposing the importation of
contract coolies, and holding that "voluntary Chinese
emigrants ought to enjoy the protection of the laws like
other citizens;" advocating thorough organization of
female labor, "the same pay for work equally well
242 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
done," "equal opportunities and rights in every field of
enterprise and labor;" urging memorial to Congress for
reimbursement of government employees whose wages
were reduced twenty per cent when the eight-hour law
took effect; demanding eight hours for convicts, and the
system now known as "public account" instead of the
contract system; condemning the "alliance existing be-
tween the Associated Press and the Western Union Tel-
egraph Company" and demanding a government tele-
graph.]
Officers elected: president- Richard Trevellick,
Michigan; first vice-president- A.. T. Cavis, District of
Columbia; second vice-president -Conrad Kuhn, New
York; secretary-H. J. Walls, Pa.; treasurer- A. W.
Phelps, Connecticut
6. THE NATIONAL COLORED LABOR
CONVENTION, 1869
(a) AS SEEN BY A WHITE LABOR UNIONIST
American Workman (Boston), Dec. 25, 1869, P- * Notwithstanding the
efforts of the National Labor Union to enroll the colored laborers in the
organization, a separate organization was formed, which held its first
convention on December 6, 1869, at Washington, D.C. A second con-
vention was held at Washington, January 12 and 13, 1871. The
following account of the proceedings of the first convention was
written by Samuel P. Cummings, a leading Knight of St. Crispin,
and delegate to the National Labor Congress of 1869, 1870, and 1872.
The Convention of colored men at Washington last
week was in some respects the most remarkable one we
ever attended. We had always had full faith in the
capacity of the negro for self-improvement, but were
not prepared to see, fresh from slavery, a body of two
hundred men, so thoroughly conversant with public af-
fairs, so independent in spirit, and so anxious apparently
to improve their social condition, as the men who repre-
sented the South, in that convention. Our experience
with them has exalted them in our estimation immense-
ly, and we feel as though the future of the colored race
on this continent was secure. The convention was called
to order by Mr. Myers, of Baltimore, and Geo. T.
Downing of Rhode Island, was chosen temporary chair-
man; and, upon assuming his position, Mr. D. made one
of the best speeches on the labor question we ever heard.
It was a gem in its way, and had his counsels been heard
too, some unpleasant things might have been avoided;
but there were a few, who evidently had some secret pur-
pose to serve, who tried to make the convention the
means of carrying it out. Prominent among these was
244 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Mr. J. M. Langston, the famous colored lawyer of Ohio,
who evidently aspiring to the leadership of his race, and
who, we hear, has been promised a high position under
the government, if he can control the colored vote of
the South, in the interest of the Republican Party. Mr.
Langston certainly possesses ability, but very little dis-
cretion, at least his course indicated it, for on the first
evening of the convention, he took occasion to insult the
white delegates from Massachusetts, and warned the
delegates to beware of us, intimating very strongly that
we were the emissaries of the Democratic Party, which
was certainly new to us, who have until this year acted
with the Republican Party. So bitter was he in his re-
marks, so uncalled for was his attack, that such men as
Sella Martin of Mass., Downing of Rhode Island,
Weare of Penn., and Myers of Maryland, felt called on
to rebuke him, and they did so with good effect. The
speech of Sella Martin in reply, was one of the most
scathing and effective we ever heard, and Mr. Lang-
ston's friends tried in vain to prevent his being heard.
But Mr. Martin was too old a fighter in the cause to be
driven, and said his say to the end, and told his brethren
very plainly that they could not afford to repel the prof-
fered sympathy of the white friends of the labor cause.
He said forcibly and truthfully that the interests of the
laboring classes, white and black on this continent were
identical, and they should work harmoniously together
for the furtherance of the cause of labor. We are happy
to say that the convention finally adopted his views, and
in their platform and address there was nothing to which
we can seriously object.
Our colleague, Mr. Charles McLean, made on Tues-
day evening a very sensible speech, which was well re-
ceived, and was followed by Senator Wilson, of our
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 245
state, who made one of the best labor speeches we ever
heard from any of our public men, and we endorse
every word of it, so far as it related to the general inter-
ests of labor in the country. Gen. Wilson seems deeply
impressed with the danger to which the laboring classes
are exposed in the wasteful extravagance exhibited in
donating the public lands for private ends, and the crys-
tallizing process going on in all the leading industries
of the country, and frankly avowed himself opposed to all
the schemes now on foot to aggrandize individuals and
corporations at the public expense. He gave the conven-
tion some very wholesome advice, that we trust will be
heeded by all the friends of labor, white or black. . .
There were of course some amusing episodes, such as a
constant rising to points of order, the piling of one mo-
tion upon another, and, as a consequence, the confusion
usually attending such a course; but the rare tact shown
by their permanent president, the Hon. John B. Harris,
of North Carolina, carried them safely through all
troubles.
And here we feel impelled to say that in all our ex-
perience in tumultuous public assemblies, we have never
seen a presiding officer show more executive ability than
Mr. Harris, and certainly he does not owe it to white
blood, as he is evidently a full-blooded negro, so far as
color and features are any evidence of being so. His
success was largely owing, we think, to the fact that he
possessed the entire confidence of the convention, as well
as superior ability for the position.
As will be seen by the newspaper reports they formed
a National Labor Union upon a basis similar to that
adopted at Philadelphia last August, and may be said
to be fairly in the field as an organized body of laborers.
Whether their course in forming an independent Na-
246 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
tional Union was wise or not, time alone can tell; but
we are convinced that for the present at least, they could
not do better. It is useless to attempt to cover up the
fact that there is still a wide gulf between the two races
in this country, and for a time at least they must each
in their own way work out a solution of this labor prob-
lem. At no very distant day they will become united,
and work in harmony together; and we who have never
felt the iron as they have, must be slow to condemn them
because they do not see as we do on this labor movement.
For ourselves, we should have felt better satisfied had
they decided to join the great national movement now
in progress, but fresh as they are from slavery, looking
as they naturally do on the Republican Party as their de-
liverers from bondage, it is not strange that they hesitate
about joining any other movement. Although they did
not distinctly recognize any party in their platform, yet
the sentiment was clearly Republican if their speeches
were any indication. Still, strange as it may seem, par-
ties were ignored in their platform, and this course was
taken mainly through the influence and votes of the
southern delegates.
Isaac Myers, a member of the present Labor Union
was chosen their permanent President for the ensuing
year,. with a good list of other officers, and in their hands
the cause will no doubt be safe. . . When we see a
convention composed mainly of those who ten years ago
were slaves on the plantations of the South, assembling
under the very shadow of the national capital, to de-
liberate on questions of grave national importance, and
conducting them with such marked ability, as to arrest
public attention, we feel sure that the day is not far dis-
tant, when the good sense of our colored friends will lead
them to join us in all honest efforts to make the interests
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 247
of labor the paramount interest in our legislation, state
and national. Till then, we can afford to wait. S. P. C.
(b) PLATFORM AND MEMORIAL TO CONGRESS
Workingman's Advocate, Jan. i, 1870, p. 4, col. 3.
The platform agrees with the platform and resolutions of the National
Labor Union on coolie labor, but adds greater emphasis on education. It
modifies the position on eight hours, cooperation and land. It omits the resolu-
tions on greenbackism, department of labor, restoration of civic rights of
southerners, convict labor, preference of working men for political office, tene-
ment house reform, incorporation of unions, taxation of the rich for war pur-
poses, taxation of government bonds, solidarity of men and women workers.
It adds the resolutions on strikes, frequent conferences between employers and
employees, intemperance, natural resources of the United States, equal rights of
white and black laborers to jobs, Freedmen's Bureau, and loyalty to the govern-
ment.
WHEREAS, labor has its privileges no less than its
duties, one of which is to organize, and, if need be, to
furnish reasons for its organization: therefore,
RESOLVED, that labor was instituted by Almighty God,
as a means of revealing the rich endowments of inani-
mate creation to be understood and used by man, and
that labor is a duty common to and the natural heritage
of the human family, each person having a natural right
to labor in any field of industry for which he or she is
capacitated, the rights to be governed and restricted only
by laws of political economy.
RESOLVED, that capital is an agent or means used by
labor for its development, and support, and labor is an
agent or means used by capital for its development and
general enhancement, and that, for the well-being and
productiveness of capital and labor, the best harmony of
fellowship and action should at all times prevail, that
"strikes" may be avoided, and the workman convinced
that justice is done him, and that he is receiving an
equivalent for the labor performed.
RESOLVED, that there should be a frequent interchange
248 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
of opinions upon all questions affecting alike the em-
ployer and employed, and that co-operation for the pur-
pose of protection and the better remuneration of labor
is a sure and safe method, invading no specific rights,
but is alike beneficial to the whole community, and
tends to elevate the working classes to higher achieve-
ments and positions in society, presents the necessity of,
and increases the desire to give their children a more
liberal education, induces the practice of economy in the
distribution of their earnings, and accelerates the accu-
mulation of wealth, with all the happiness which must
necessarily ensue therefrom.
RESOLVED, that intemperance is the natural foe and
curse of the American family, especially the working
classes, its terrible effects being to disease, cbrrupt and
otherwise disfigure and destroy the constitution, pro-
ducing vice, crime, and poverty where peace and plenty
would otherwise exist.
RESOLVED, that education is one of the strongest safe-
guards of the Republican Party, the bulwark of Amer-
ican citizens, and a defence against the invasion of the
rights of man; its liberal distributions to all, without
regard to race, creed or sex, is necessary for the well-
being and advancement of society, and that all should
enjoy its blessing alike in each of the states and territories
of the United States; that educated labor is more pro-
ductive, is worth and commands higher rates of wages,
is less dependent upon capital ; therefore it is essentially
necessary to the rapid and permanent development of
the agricultural, manufacturing, and mechanical growth
and interests of the nation that there shall be a liberal
free school system enacted by the legislatures of the sev-
eral states for the benefit of all the inhabitants thereof.
RESOLVED, that the government of the United States,
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 249
republican in form, is a government of the people, for
the people, and by the people; and that all men are
equal in political rights and entitled to the largest poli-
tical and religious liberty compatible with the good
order of society; as, also, the use and enjoyment of the
fruits of their labor and talents ; and that no laws should
be made by any legislative body to the advantage of one
class and against the interest and advantage of the other,
but that all legislation for the benefit of all the people of
any particular state, and of the United States, to the end
that loyalty to and love for the institutions and the gov-
ernment of the United States should be a permanent
consideration with all the citizens thereof.
RESOLVED, that we return our thanks to Divine Prov-
idence for the immense natural resources that are within
the geographical limits of the United States of America,
whereby the application of diligent and patient labor is
capable of producing from our earth all the necessities
for human existence and the comfort of man, and, from
its vast and unbounded supply has become the greatest
moral agent known to man, in that it affords a refuge
for the oppressed of all lands, to improve their condition,
and, by the influence of our institutions, elevate them to
their proper standard of manhood; its rebounding in-
fluence is to destroy the tyranny and despotism of the
Old World.
RESOLVED, that we feel it to be a duty that we owe to
ourselves, to society, and to our country to encourage
by all means within our reach, industrial habits among
our people, the learning of trades and professions by
our children without regard to sex; to educate and im-
press them with the fact that all labor is honorable and
a sure road to wealth; that habits of economy and tem-
perance combined with industry and education, "are the
250 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
great safe-guard of free republican institutions, the ele-
vator of the condition of man, the motive-power to
increase trade and commerce, and to make the whole of
this land the wealthiest and happiest on the face of the
globe.
RESOLVED, that regarding the labor of the country, the
common property of the people, no portion should be
excluded therefrom because of the geographical division
of the globe in which they or their forefathers were born,
or on account of status or color, but that every man or
woman should receive employment according to his or
her ability to perform the labor required, without any
other test ; that the exclusion of colored men, and appren-
tices from the right to labor in any department of indus-
try or workshops, in any of the states and territories of
the United States, by what is known as "trade unions," is
an insult to God, injury to us, and disgrace to humanity;
while we extend a free and welcome hand to the free im-
migration of labor of all nationalities, we emphatically
deem imported, contract, coolie labor to be a positive in-
jury to the working people of the United States -is but
the system of slavery in a new form, and we appeal to the
Congress of the United States to rigidly enforce the act
of 1862, prohibiting coolie importations, and to enact
such other laws as will best protect and free American
labor against this or any similar form of slavery.
RESOLVED, that we do not regard capital as the natural
enemy of labor; that each is dependent on the other for
the existence : that the great conflict daily waged between
them is for want of a better understanding between the
representatives of capital and labor, and we therefore
recommend the study of political economy in all of our
labor organizations as a means to understand the rela-
tionships of labor to capital, and as a basis for the ad-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 251
journment of many of the disputes that arise between
employer and employee.
RESOLVED, that we recommend the establishment of
cooperative workshops, land, building and loan associa-
tions among our people as a remedy against their exclu-
sion from other workshops on account of color, as a
means of furnishing employment, as well as a protection
against the aggression of capital and as the easiest and
shortest method of enabling every man to procure a
homestead for his family; and to accomplish this end we
would particularly impress the greatest importance of
the observance of diligence in business, and the practice
of rigid economy in our social and domestic arrange-
ments.
RESOLVED, that we regard the use of intoxicating
liquors as the most damaging and damnable habits prac-
ticed by the human family; that we denounce the in-
famous practice planters have of drenching their em-
ployees with this poisonous drug (with or without cost) ,
intended to stupify their brain and incapacitate them
to know the condition of their accounts, the value of
their labor, and to rob them of their sense and feelings
of humanity; that we appeal to our people to discounte-
nance the use of intoxicating liquors, because of its effects
to shorten life and because it is the great cause of so
much misery and poverty among the working classes
of the country, and we advise the organization of tem-
perance associations as a necessary instrument for the
speedy and permanent elevation of our people.
RESOLVED, that we regard education as one of the
greatest blessings that the human family enjoys, and that
we earnestly appeal to our fellow citizens to allow no
opportunity, no matter how limited and remote, to pass
unimproved, that the thanks of the colored people of
252 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
this country is due to the Congress of the United States
for the establishment and maintenance of the Freed-
man's Bureau, and to Major General O. O. Howard,
commissioner; Rev. J. W. Alvord, and John M. Lang-
ston, Esq., general inspectors, for their co-operative la-
bors in the establishment and good government of hun-
dreds of schools in the Southern States, whereby thou-
sands of men, women and children, have been, and are
now being taught the rudiments of an English educa-
tion. The thanks of the whole people are due to these
philanthropists and friends to the benevolent institution
of this and other countries for the means and efforts in
money and teachers furnished, whereby our race is being
elevated to the proper standard of intelligent American
citizens, and we appeal to the friends of progress and to
our citizens of the several states to continue their efforts
to the various legislatures until every state can boast of
having a free school system, that knows no distinction
in dissemination of knowledge to its inhabitants on ac-
count of race, color, sex, creed or previous condition;
and
RESOLVED, that we recommend a faithful obedience
to the laws of the United States and of the several states
in which we may reside ; that the Congress and the courts
of the United States have ample power to protect its
citizens. All grievances, whether personal or public
should be carried to the proper tribunal, and from the
lowest to the highest, until justice is granted ; that armed
resistance against the laws is treason against the United
States, and ought to be summarily punished. We fur-
ther appeal to the colored workingmen to form organ-
izations throughout every state and territory, that they
may be able in those districts far removed from courts
of justice to communicate with the Bureau of Labor to
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 253
be established by the National Labor Union, and that
justice may be meted out to them as though they lived
in the large cities, where justice is more liberally dis-
tributed; that loyalty and love for the government may
be fostered and encouraged, and prosperity and peace
may pervade the entire land.
New York Daily Tribune, Dec. 11, 1869, p. 3, col. 6.
. . . The chief matter of interest was a memorial
prepared by Capt. Mackey of South Carolina, setting
forth that the average wages of agricultural laborers in
the South was but sixty dollars per annum; that the
planters were combined to keep labor down; that this
combination was made more bitter from political mo-
tives, and its influence was so great that it was impossi-
ble, as matters stood, for the colored laborer to exercise
civic privileges except at the risk of his livelihood, poor
as that was. To remedy this, labor must be made more
scarce, and the best way to do that was to make laborers
land owners. Congress is to be asked, therefore, to
subdivide the public lands in the South into twenty-acre
farms, to make one year's residence entitle a settler to a
patent, and also to place in the hands of a Commission
a sum of money, not exceeding two million dollars, to
aid their settlement, and also to purchase lands in states
where no public lands are found, the money to be loaned
for five years, without interest. Congress will also be
asked not to restore to southern railroads the lapsed land
grants of 1856, and to require that Texas, prior to read-
mission to representation, shall put her public lands
under the operations of provisions similar to the U. S.
Homestead law of 1866. . .
Daily Morning Chronicle (Washington, D.C.), Jan. 14, 1871, p. 4, col. 4.
[At the session of 1871 the foregoing positions were
254 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
reaffirmed; a high protective tariff and the Republican
Party were endorsed. The president, Isaac Myers, said
in his annual address:]
The labor reform party as a means for the elevation
of the condition of the workingmen, and to adjust the
disputed questions between capital and labor, is a grand
farcical claptrap, cunningly worked upon the unwary
workingmen by intriguing politicians, and is even more
disastrous to their cause than the numerous ill-advised
strikes. Its pretensions to a wholesale panacea to ele-
vate the condition of the laboring masses to a financial
equality with capital, by getting control of the national
and local legislation of the country, is as deceptious and
preposterous as the heathen philosophy of producing
gold by chemical operation. Whilst labor has a gen-
eral interest to be protected by national legislation, such
as a national education law, land grants to actual set-
tlers, and a tariff for protection to American industries,
it also has certain special interest, the chief of which is
wages, in all the varied industries of the country, which
can not be regulated by any political legislative body
that can be brought into existence.
To attempt to make paper the standard of value, and
regulate the commercial and moneyed interest of the
country thereon, is to revolutionize the political econ-
omy of the universe and bankrupt the entire nation.
To attempt to establish a rate of interest for the Unit-
ed States at three per cent, and make the law so effective
as that no man can charge or receive more, is as impolitic
as it is impracticable.
To attempt by legislation to establish United States
banks and United States mills, to keep them supplied
with paper to be loaned at three per cent, payable at
pleasure, is a fanatical semi-Grecian idea that must nat-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 255
urally clog the wheels of industry and lead the whole
people back into a state of barbarism.
This labor party organization naturally forces capital
to organize and consolidate, without regard to previous
political feeling, for its own protection and safety, which
is placed in jeopardy by its success. And for that party
to ally with the Democratic Party, as is its habit and
claim to be working in the interest of the workingmen
of the United States, is a contradiction of principle with
practice. The Democratic Party is not specially noted
anywhere for its liberality of legislation in the interest
of the working classes, except it be to increase the bur-
den of taxation. Besides the general disarrangement,
confusion, and disaster that must assuredly follow the
success of such a party organization is the general demor-
alization of the workingmen. . .
Daily Morning Chronicle, Jan. 14, 1871, p. 4, col. 3-4.
. . . Mr. Belcher, of Georgia, offered a resolu-
tion condemning both the Democratic Party and its
sentiments of repudiation; also, the National Labor
Congress, which, in its platform adopted in its meeting
held at Cincinnati, Ohio, August 19, 1870, criticises vio-
lently, unfairly, illogically, the financial policy of the
present administration, and declares, in fact, in favor'
of the repudiation of our national obligations, and that
they utterly condemn the doctrine contained therein as
anti-republican and false.
This was the cause of a spirited debate, in which some
unkind words were said.
The debate was finally closed by Mr. George T.
Downing, who introduced a resolution indorsing the
course of Mr. Isaac Myers, president of the colored Na-
tional Labor Union, in the National Labor Congress,
held in Cincinnati, and expressing entire confidence in
256 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
his integrity to the principles and policy of the Repub-
lican Party. The resolution was adopted by acclama-
tion. . .
. . . Mr. Downing, from the Committee on Cap-
ital and Labor, submitted the following : . . . Your
committee would simply refer to the unkind, estranging
policy of the labor organizations of white men, who,
while they make loud proclaims as to the injustice (as
they allege) to which they are subjected, justify injus-
tice so far as giving an example to do so may, by exclud-
ing from their benches, and their workshops worthy
craftsmen and apprentices only because of their color,
for no just cause. We say to such, so long as you per-
sist therein we can not fellowship with you in your
struggle, and look for failure and mortification on your
part; not even the sacred name of Wendell Phillips can
save you, however much we revere him and cherish to-
ward him not only profound respect, but confidence and
gratitude. . .
7. CINCINNATI CONGRESS, AUGUST 15-22,
1870
(a) DELEGATES
Working-man's Advocate, Aug. 27, 1870, p. i, col. 2.
Samuel D. Rose, Cincinnati Typographical Union,
No. 3 ; William J. McCarty, Labor Union, No. 5, New
York; John P. Flanagan, Iron Moulders' Union, No.
3, Cincinnati; Elisha Stout, Workingmen's Association,
Schuylkill County, Penn.; B. H. Campbell, Machin-
ists' Union, Louisville, Ky. ; James McGonigal, Amer-
ican Industrial League, Detroit, Mich. ; John Brady and
John Siney, Miners' and Laborers' Union, Schuylkill
County, Pa. ; R. Gilchrist, Stonemasons' Union, Louis-
ville; J. W. Browning, Bricklayers' Union, New York;
Mrs. E. A. Lane, Daughters of St. Crispin, Lynn, Mass. ;
John Sperry, Stonemasons' Union, Penn. ; F. Blanchard,
Knights of St. Crispin, Walnut Hills Lodge, No. 104,
Cincinnati; O. P. Julian, Workingmen's Union, In-
dianapolis; Wm. Haller, Workingmen's Organization,
Cincinnati ; F. O'Donohue, Workingmen's Association,
New York; Wm. T. Hill, Labor Lodge, Jackson Coun-
ty, 111.; J. T. Whittick, Knights of St. Crispin, Coving-
ton, Ky., Hugh Cameron, Labor Union, Kansas ; John
Collins, H. Temple and Thomas W. Flood, Internation-
al Typographical Union ; Alexander Troup, Labor Un-
ion, New York; F. A. Long, Labor Association, New-
port, Ky. ; J. B. Wolff, Agricultural Labor Association,
Virginia; R. F. Trevellick, Ovid, Michigan, represen-
tative of the Cigarmakers of Detroit, and Labor Union
of Hillsdale County; C. A. Merrill, Riggers' Union,
2 5 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
San Francisco; W. D. Delany, Mechanics' Council, San
Francisco; R. W. Latham, New Brunswick; J. Bell,
Miners' Association, District No. i, Brazil, Ind. ; H. O.
Sheldon, Labor Union, Oberlin, Ohio; S. P. Cummings
and C. McLean, State Labor Union Massachusetts; G.
O. Walters, Harness Makers, Cincinnati; Toliver
Crews, American Miners' Association, Illinois; Ben
Tilters, Hocking Valley, Nelsonville, Ohio ; A. C. Cam-
eron, Plasterers' Union, Chicago; E. M. Davis, Labor
Assembly, Cincinnati; W. E. Owens, District No. i,
Miners' Association, Illinois; John A. Curran, Iron-
moulders' Union, No. 20, Covington, Ky. ; A. Camp-
bell, Hope Labor Union, LaSalle, Illinois; A. Cannon,
Star City Branch Labor Union, No. i, Lafayette, In-
diana; C. H. Lucker, Ironmoulders' Union, Nashville,
Tenn. ; Alonzo Ramsdell, Ironmoulders' Union, and La-
bor Union, Chicago; James Smith, Knights of St. Cris-
pin, Cincinnati; R. Hodgkin, Harnessmakers' Union,
Detroit; F. W. Higgins, Ecrose and Springwell Farm-
ers' Club, Michigan; Miss M. M. Walbridge, Daugh-
ters of St. Crispin, Stoneham, Massachusetts; Charles
Whitney, Social and Political Labor Union, Illinois ; E.
E. Peters, Preemptors' Union, Washington, D.C. ; Al-
len Coffin, National Guard Industry, Washington, D.C. ;
R. Griffith, International Lodge, Knights of St. Cris-
pin ; A. W. Phelps, Carpenters' and Joiners' Union, New
Haven, Connecticut; M. W. Field, Labor Union, No. 2,
Detroit; Wm. Saffin, Molders' International Union; F.
P. Baker and Amos Sanford, State Labor Union, Kan-
sas ; Hugh Cameron, State Labor Union, No. i, Topeka,
Kansas; A. P. Bradford, Machinists' and Blacksmiths',
Cincinnati; L. McHugh, Ironmolders' Union, No. 4,
Cincinnati; Wm. Cogswell, Ironmolders' Union, Alton,
Illinois; W. J. Jessup, Workingmen's Association, State
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 259
of New York; Isaac Myers, National Colored Associa-
tion, Baltimore; Owen Foy and Charles H. Rihl, State
of Indiana; Conrad Kuhn, Arbeiter Union, New York
City; Isaac C. Weare, United Hodcarriers' and Labor-
ers' Association, Philadelphia; Peter H. Clarke, Col-
ored Teachers' Co-operative Association, Cincinnati;
T. S. Nelson and Charles R. Anderson, State Labor
Union, Missouri; Mrs. Hathaway, Workingwomen's
Co-operation, Chicago; Mrs. Willard, Sewing Girls'
Union [Chicago] ; John Magwire, Ironmolders' Union,
No. 10, St. Louis; David Delay, Labor Union, Hamil-
ton, Ohio; John Walters, Cigar Makers' Union, No. 4,
Cincinnati, Ohio; Albert E. Redstone, Industrial
League, Vallejo, Cal. ; John Harris, Cleveland Labor
Union, No. i ; A. M. Puett, Labor Union, Greencastle,
Ind., Isaac P. Depew, Workingmen's Assembly, Syra-
cuse, N.Y. ; Thos. H. Davis, Miners' and Laborers'
Benevolent Association, Tuscarora Valley, O. ; Daniel
Richey, Labor Union, No. 4, Eden, LaSalle County,
111. ; Colonel Daniel S. Curtiss, Mechanics' State Coun-
cil, San Francisco; Daniel Thomas, Labor Assembly,
Cincinnati; Chas. R. Anderson and Geo. W. Hall, Ma-
con Country Labor Union, Mo.
[At the session on the second day the following oc-
curred:] A motion was made to tender the privileges
of the floor to the Hon. S. F. Gary. Carried. 25 Mr.
Coffin moved that Professor J. F. Langston, (colored)
be also admitted. Mr. Troup moved to table the mo-
tion. The chair put the first motion, which was carried
unanimously, and General Gary was invited inside the
bar by the president. General Gary took a seat inside
amid flattering applause.
25 For Gary's speech in Congress advocating the measures of the National
Labor Union, see Congressional Globe, 4Oth congress, third session, part i, pp.
195-200.
260 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
A motion to extend to Prof. John F. Langston the
privileges of the floor, called forth considerable discus-
sion from various members. Mr. Troup, of New York,
addressed the convention at considerable length, and in
a feeling manner. He complained that Prof. Langston
in the late National Labor Congress endeavored to use
the colored laboring men in the interests of the Repub-
lican Party. He, the speaker, was opposed to any pol-
itician, be he Democrat or Republican, being allowed
to enter this convention. He entered his solemn pro-
test against anything in the shape of politics influencing
the deliberations of this body. Mr. Cummings said he
had no doubt that Langston was here in the interests of
the Republican Party. He is an office-holder under
Grant's administration and he is here only to work for
that party. He did not oppose him on personal
grounds -was an original abolitionist himself, but the
principle involved is that no one has any right here who
is not with the labor movement and its principles with-
out regard to politics. Here this man is sought to be
foisted upon this Congress after he had not only done
all he could to estrange the colored laborers from the
white laborers at the last Congress, but insulted him and
other delegates from Massachusetts, because they ob-
jected. He hoped Mr. Coffin would withdraw his mo-
tion. Mr. Coffin would not withdraw it nor retract a
single word. Mr. Langston is objected to because he is
a member of the Republican Party, yet here a man is ad-
mitted who is prominently and notoriously identified
with the Democratic Party with no more claims, nor as
many upon the courtesies of this Congress. He did not
know whether Mr. Langston was an office-holder or not,
but would like to be informed. Mr. McLean confirmed
Mr. Cummings' statements, and supported his objec-
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 261
tions to admitting Langston, whom he also objected to
because he was a foe not to 35,000,000 people, but to
4,000,000. Like Mr. Cummings, he objected to no man
on personal grounds, or on account of color; no, not even
to John Chinaman (applause) ; but they must all come
here recognizing the great principles of the Labor Con-
gress. After a lengthened discussion participated in
by Messrs. Weare (colored), Sheldon, of Missouri
[Ohio?], Browning, of New York, Coffin and Myers
(colored) , the motion to exclude Mr. Langston was car-
ried by a vote of forty-nine to twenty-three.
Mr. Cummings offered a resolution to admit Hon.
P. B. Pinchbeck (colored), of Louisiana, to the priv-
ileges of the floor, which after deliberation was tabled.
(b) REPORTS OF OFFICERS
[After prayer by Rev. H. O. Sheldon, President Tre-
vellick, in his annual address, spoke of the lack of means
to print the proceedings of the preceding congress;
stated that the appeal for the Sylvis Monument Fund
"met with but little favor;" that he had appointed the
following his executive council : Hon. Alex. Campbell,
Lasalle, Illinois; Hon. John Magwire, St. Louis, Mis-
souri; Wm. J. McLaughlin, Milford, Massachusetts;
Hon. A. M. Puett, Greencastle, Indiana; General A.
M. West, Water Valley, Mississippi; that he had ap-
pointed the following as executive officers, under Ar-
ticle 4, Section i : Alex. Troup, for the State of New
York; H. O. Sheldon, Missouri; F. C. Tinker, Wiscon-
sin; S. P. Cummings, Massachusetts; Wm. Cogswell,
Illinois; Amos Sanford, Kansas; Jas. C. Sylvis, Penn-
sylvania; Clinton Briggs, Nebraska; Hal. T. Walker,
Alabama; O. B. Daily, Ohio; F. S. Miller, Tennessee;
Wm. H. Stywald, East Virginia; George Keen, Iowa;
262 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
C. W. Peaslee, New Hampshire; C. F. Newell, Maine;
R. Gilchrist, Kentucky; Dyer D. Turner, Vermont;
that the committee on state prison labor and obnoxious
laws had accomplished "much good" as shown by an-
swers received from the governors of several states. He
recommended separate state organizations ; commented
on the large amount of correspondence, and his own ab-
sence of one hundred and sixty-nine days, holding meet-
ings in different states, which convinced him of the wide-
spread political unrest, the results in Massachusetts
especially being "manifest to all ;" spoke of the need of
finances for additional lecturers; recommended that the
organization declare itself "a distinct political party,
denominated as the Labor Reform Party," and calling
national and state conventions to nominate candidates;
stated that the unemployed during four months of the
past year reached "not less than 1,300,000 men," and
"hundreds of thousands" in midsummer; repeated the
evils of the currency contracted "not to exceed twelve
dollars and fifty cents per capita ;" maintained that with
the Labor Reform Platform "it would have been im-
possible to have contracted the currency so as to create
a panic;" that interconvertible bonds would be needed
to enable the government to develop water transporta-
tion ; that less than one-third of the public domain had
passed into the hands of the actual settler; and repeated
the arguments against importation but favorable to vol-
untary immigration of the Chinese. He reported one
hundred and twenty-seven charters issued during the
year. The Treasurer reported receipts, including, $325
borrowed, $1,875.46; expenditures, $1,548.17; balance
on hand, $327.29. Sylvis fund $125.20; paid Mrs. Sylvis
$10.00, balance on hand, $115.20. The auditing com-
mittee reported total expenses, $4,125.69, receipts,
$2,119.50, indebtedness to the president, $1,510.29, to
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 263
the treasurer, $2.29; to A. C. Cameron, balance on ex-
penses as delegate to Europe, $503.97.]
(c) THE CONSTITUTION
[After considerable discussion a resolution was adopt-
ed, sixty to five, authorizing the president to appoint a
committee "whose duty it shall be to call at the earliest
practicable moment, a national convention, in order to
complete the organization of a National Labor Party."
Thereupon the constitution of the National Labor Union
was modified so as to constitute a purely industrial body,
the following changes being made and the new constitu-
tion as a whole adopted, by a vote of twenty-five to
twelve.]
PREAMBLE. This organization shall be known as the
National Labor Union of the United States, and shall
be composed of such labor and trade organizations as
may now or shall hereafter exist. [Omitted: "having
for their object the amelioration of the condition of those
who labor for a living."]
ITS OBJECT. The object of this organization is to ex-
amine and discuss in congress assembled all grievances,
laws and customs which oppress labor; to educate and
elevate the working masses; and submit for their action
such measures as will insure justice to all.
CONGRESS. This Union shall be a National Labor
Congress, composed of delegates based upon the equal
representation of all its members.
THE DUTIES OF OFFICERS. . . The president, at his
earliest convenience, shall appoint an executive officer
in each state and territory. Each officer so appointed
shall, as soon as possible after receiving his appointment
proceed to call a state convention for the purpose of
forming a state assembly, except in states already or-
ganized.
264 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
The president of the National Labor Union is hereby
authorized to issue a charter to any state or territorial
organization whenever the application made is signed
by delegates of at least five local labor unions which
meet at the call of the executive officer of the state or ter-
ritory.
Each state organization shall make such laws for its
own guidance as may to it seem most effective, provided
that such laws do not in any way conflict with the con-
stitution of the National Labor Union.
Twenty-one members in any labor union shall be
sufficient to apply for a charter, which shall be granted
on the payment of three dollars; but no charter shall be
granted to any union in any precinct where a prior or-
ganization exists.
This constitution shall not be construed as preventing
the various trades from organizing separate state trade
organizations, nor shall it be construed to prevent said
state or local trade organization from being represented
in this Congress.
All questions not herein provided for shall be de-
cided by a majority. It shall require ten members to
call the yeas and nays.
It shall be the duty of each labor organization to re-
port to the executive officer of its state such information
as may be necessary for the performance of his duty
until a state assembly is formed, and then the reports
shall be made to him from the state assembly ; and such
report shall be made at least once a month.
Representation in the Union Labor Congress of each
state or territorial trade or labor union shall be entitled
to one delegate or fractional part thereof.
Each international trade organization shall be entitled
nine]
NATIONAL LABOR UNION
265
to ten delegates, or one for every 3,000 or fractional part
thereof, when not represented by any state organization.
When there is not a sufficient number of organizations
in a state or territory to form a state or territorial organ-
ization, such state or territory shall be entitled to one
delegate in this Congess, provided they have twenty-five
members, and they shall pay a tax of ten dollars, if they
have not more than one hundred members, and ten cents
for each member over one hundred, and such organiza-
tion shall form themselves into a state or territorial or-
ganization as soon as they shall have a sufficient number
to entitle them to the same.
REVENUE. Each state organization shall, at a speci-
fied time, report to the president of the National Labor
Union the number of members represented in their state
organizations, and the president shall bring an annual
tax of ten cents on each member so represented.
(d) REFORM, RESOLUTIONS, AND OFFICERS
[There was an extended debate on the formation of an
independent political party, favored by Cummings, Gil-
christ, Depew, Cameron, Trevellick, Troup, Flanagan,
McHugh, Sheldon, Lavine, and Cogswell ; opposed by
Collins and the colored delegates, Myers and Weare;
but finally endorsed, sixty to five. An amendment by
Coffin and McLean, of Boston, disclaiming repudiation
of the national debt was laid on the table, forty-five to
fifteen. The financial planks, after opposition by Peters,
Magwire, Coffin, Collins and Sorge, were adopted by
"large majorities." The tariff plank, opposed by Troup,
Sorge, Ritchie, Flanagan, favored by Sheldon, Red-
stone, Siney, Kuhn, was adopted, sixty-four ta eight.
The coolie immigration plank was opposed by McLean
2 66 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
and Coffin, who favored voluntary immigration, as pro-
vided in the plank of 1869. The platform adopted as
a whole was substantially the same as that of 1869, ex-
cept the omission of the former planks on women's work,
"religion, morality and knowledge," voluntary associa-
tions of working men, restoration of civil rights to every
American citizen, contract labor in prisons, settlement
on public lands, preference for workmen for office, im-
proved dwellings; and the following new planks or
changed versions of former planks :]
RESOLVED, that the claim of the bondholders for pay-
ment in gold of that class of indebtedness known as 5-20
bonds, the principal of which is legally and equitably
payable in lawful money -is dishonest and extortionate,
and hence we enter our solemn protest against any de-
parture from the original contract, by funding the debt
in long bonds, or in any way increasing the gold bearing
and untaxed obligations of the government. . .
RESOLVED, that congress should modify the tariff so
as to admit free the necessaries of life, and such articles
of common use as we can neither produce nor grow ; also
to lay duties for revenue, mainly upon articles of luxury,
and upon such articles of manufacture as, we, having
the raw material in abundance, will develop the re-
sources of the country; increase the number of factories;
give employment to more laborers, maintain good com-
pensation, cause the immigration of skilled labor, the
lessening of prices to consumers, the creating of a per-
manent home market for agricultural products, destroy
the necessity for the odious and expensive system of in-
ternal taxation, and will soon enable us to successfully
compete with the manufacturers of Europe in the mar-
kets of the world. . .
RESOLVED, that the presence in our country of Chinese
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 267
laborers in large numbers is an evil entailing want and
its consequent train of misery and crime on all other
classes of the American people, and should be prevented,
by legislation. . .
RESOLVED, that the public lands of the United States
belong to the people, and should not be sold to individ-
uals, nor granted to corporations but should be held
as a sacred trust for the benefit of the people, and should
be granted, free of cost, to landless settlers only, in
amounts not exceeding one hundred and sixty acres of
land.
RESOLVED, that the treaty-making power of the gov-
ernment has no authority in the constitution to "dis-
pose of" the public lands without the joint sanction of
the Senate and House of Representatives.
[The following was also reported and acted upon:]
Mrs. E. A. Lane, of Boston, Mass., submitted the fol-
lowing: RESOLVED, that we the representatives of the
workingwomen, do hereby endorse the action of the
National Labor Congress during the past year.
MRS. ERMINE A. LANE,
Miss MARTHA WALBRIDGE,
MISS MCDERMOTT.
RESOLVED, by this National Labor Congress, that we
demand for our toiling sisters the same rate of wages
for equal work that we receive for ours.
2. We also ask all who are represented (by delegate)
in this convention, and also all working-men of our
country, to do all in their power to open many of the
closed avenues of industry to women, and welcome her
entering into just competition with men in the industrial
race of life.
The resolutions were unanimously adopted/ . .
[By Mr. Sorge] RESOLVED, that the National Labor
268 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Union, assembled in congress, declares its adhesion to
the principles of the International Workingmen's As-
sociation, and expects at no distant day to affiliate with it.
RESOLVED, that the Bureau of Executive Officers of
the National Labor Union be directed to investigate the
characters of labor unions in the State of New York,
and correct all errors found.
[Adopted.]
[Other resolutions adopted : Warning against mili-
tarism; against discrimination a in pay and pensions in
favor of the officers and against the soldiers;" favoring
reduction of hours of labor; inviting farmers and work-
ing men to unite; inviting "common or unskilled labor"
to cooperate "in our efforts to improve the conditions of
the productive classes;" affirming that "the highest in-
terest of our colored fellow-citizens is with the working
men, who, like themselves, are slaves of capital and pol-
iticians;" exempting ship-building material from im-
port duty; opposing the action of the governor of Kan-
sas and the president of the United States in stationing
troops on the Cherokee neutral lands to protect the Joy
claim against the actual settlers; ordering payment of
the balance of the Sylvis fund to the children of Sylvis ;
renewing the resolution to collect labor statistics; keep-
ing record of the votes of congressmen; ordering the
proceedings to be printed in English and German ; nam-
ing the Workingman's Advocate of Chicago and the
Arbelter Union of New York as official organs of the
National Labor Union and the National Reform Party,
and the following as state organs: Anthracite Monitor,
Tamaqua, Pa. ; American Workman, for Massachusetts ;
Workingmen's Journal of Columbus, for Kansas ; Work-
ingmen's Journal of San Francisco, for California;
Homestead Champion for the District of Columbia.
nine] NATIONAL LABOR UNION 269
[Resolutions laid on the table, or referred to commit-
tee without action: by Kuhn, government ownership of
railroads, canals, telegraphs, and all other means of com-
munication; by Coffin, direct election of president of
United States; by Delaney of California, fixing a day
for all mechanics to establish the eight-hour system.]
Officers elected: president, R. F. Trevellick; first
vice-president, Conrad Kuhn ; second vice-president,
Mrs. E. O. G. Willard; secretary, John W. Brown-
ing; treasurer, A. W. Phelps.
8. ST. LOUIS CONGRESS, 1871
Workingman's Advocate, Aug. 19, 1871, p. x, col. 2.
DELEGATES- R. F. Trevellick, Labor Union, No. i,
Detroit; James C. Sylvis, State Labor Union, Pa.; T.
O. Crews, Labor Union, Murphysboro, 111. ; Geo. H.
Weaver, Labor Union, No. 6, Harrisburg, Pa.; E. M.
Davis, Labor Union, Cincinnati, Ohio; A. C. Cameron,
Labor Union, No. 2, Chicago, 111.; Jno. Siney, Ex-
board of Schuylkill Co., Pa.; Mrs. E. O. G. Willard,
Workingwomen's Union, Chicago, 111.; C. Ben John-
son, State General Council Miners' and Laborers' Bene-
fit Association, of Pa. ; Victor M. Reitz, St. Louis Labor
Union; Theo. W. Herr, Labor Union, No. 13, Lan-
caster, Pa. ; George E. Smith, Labor Union, Water Val-
ley, Miss. ; Ben. F. Sylvis, Labor Union, Leavenworth,
Kansas; H. H. Day, Financial Reform Association,
N.Y. City ; Jno. A. McClure, State Labor Union of Pa. ;
H. O. Sheldon, Reform Association, Oberlin, O. ; A. M.
Puett, Labor Union, Greencastle, Indiana; Wm. Cogs-
well, Iron Moulders' Union, Ottawa, 111. ; Ed. Aldrich,
Agricultural Union, Oak Ridge, Miss. ; W. D. Delaney,
Mechanics' State Council and Labor Union, No. i, San
Francisco, Cal. ; G. W. Hall, State Labor Union of Mis-
souri ; J. P. Manley, State Labor Union, of Ohio.
[President Trevellick reported state organizations
formed in Pennsylvania, California, and Connecticut;
nineteen local charters issued from the national office,
and over one hundred by state organizations; he had
traveled over sixteen states; national and state legisla-
tion encouraging; state conventions have incorporated
"with their platforms at least a portion of our princi-
NATIONAL LABOR UNION 271
pies ;" the executive committee met in Washington, Jan-
uary 17, 1871, and organized the National Labor Party;
recommended more explicit announcement as to whether
this was a political or an industrial body; recited viola-
tion of eight-hour law; reiterated "the important ques-
tion of the importation of the Chinese;" exonerated the
miners of Pennsylvania; emphasized the importance of
more correct knowledge of wages, hours, and unemploy-
ment; pointed out that the Supreme Court decisions on
the "Greenback" leave "the question of the power to is-
sue money that shall be American money and a legal
tender no longer an open question." Finance committee
reported moneys received by the president, $551.25 ; due
on president's salary, $1,458.75; due president's clerk,
$383.70; "total belonging to thi.s congress, $224.24."
The separation of the political from the industrial or-
ganization was made definite by calling the convention
of the National Labor Party to be held at Columbus,
Ohio, in February, 1872 ; and the National Labor Union
at Nashville, Tennessee, in September, 1872 (afterwards
changed to Cleveland, Ohio). The platform of the
political party was reaffirmed with the following addi-
tion:]
That it be the duty of the government to so exercise
its power over railroads and telegraph corporations that
the actual capital honestly invested therein, shall in no
case realize exceeding six per cent upon the amount so
invested.
[Resolutions were adopted on National Labor Bu-
reau, land, cooperation, industrial equality for women,
and coolie importation. Officers elected were Richard
Trevellick, president; Horace H. Day, first vice-presi-
dent; C. Ben Johnson, secretary; A. C. Cameron, treas-
urer.]
9 . POLITICAL CONVENTION AND
INDUSTRIAL CONGRESS, 1872
[The National Labor Reform Party held its conven-
tion at Columbus, Ohio, February 21-22, 1872. Among
the delegates, the leading ones who had attended pre-
ceding congresses were: Troup of Connecticut; Camp-
bell, Cameron, and Hinchcliffe, of Illinois; Cameron of
Kansas; Chamberlain and Cummings of Massachusetts;
Trevellick and Field of Michigan; Day of New York;
Davis, Fehrenbatch, Flanagan, Lucker, and Sheldon, of
Ohio; Johnson, Kilgore, Siney, and J. C. Sylvis, of
Pennsylvania ; and Puett of Indiana. Other states rep-
resented were Arkansas, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri,
New Jersey. Charges were made of efforts to control
the convention in order to influence the nominations of
the Republican and Democratic Parties, and that the
full delegation from Pennsylvania was able to attend
"through the courtesy of Thomas Scott," of the Penn-
sylvania Railroad Company. It was voted that the dele-
gation from each state should cast the full electoral vote
of each state, on the ground that Ohio and Pennsylvania
had full delegations, while others had not the facilities
or means of travel. John Siney was elected temporary
chairman, and Edwin M. Chamberlain, of Massachu-
setts, permanent chairman. The platform of preceding
years was adopted. Resolutions were offered by Elliott
of New York, favoring government ownership and the
referendum, but voted down. On the first formal ballot
for nomination for president of the United States, the
votes were: Judge David Davis, of Illinois, 88; Wen-
NATIONAL LABOR UNION 273
dell Phillips, 52 ; Governor John W. Geary, of Penn-
sylvania, 45; Horace H. Day, of New York, 8; Gov-
ernor Joel Parker, of New Jersey, 7 ; George W. Julian,
7. On the third ballot Davis was nominated. The nom-
inee for vice-president was Governor Parker. Judge
Davis gave a qualified acceptance, but after the Demo-
cratic convention he declined, explaining his action as
follows: "Having regarded that movement as the in-
itiation of a policy and purpose to unite the various
political elements in a compact opposition, I consented
to the use of my name before the Cincinnati [Demo-
cratic] Convention, where a distinguished citizen of
New York [Horace Greeley] was nominated." A meet-
ing of the executive committee at Columbus in August
decided that it was too late to renominate candidates.-
Workingman's Advocate, March 2, June 22, August 24,
1872.
[The "Industrial" Congress met at Cleveland, Sep-
tember 1 6, with only seven persons present, including
Trevellick and Cameron. The following was adopted :]
Worklngman's Advocate, Sept. 21, 1872, p. 2, col. 5.
RESOLVED, that a committee of three be appointed,
(of which Mr. A. M. Foran, of the Cooper's Interna-
tional Union, shall be one) to open a correspondence
with the presidents of the various state, national and in-
ternational trade and labor unions, requesting them to
meet in conference with the officers of the National
Labor Union, at such time and place as may hereafter be
designated, to take into consideration the expediency of
calling a national industrial congress, whose primary
object shall be to discuss questions of a non-political
character, of which we would suggest the follo\ying:
i st. How to secure the adoption and enforcement of
the eight hour system.
274
AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
2d. Co-operation -What it means and how to secure
its successful application to manufacturing enterprises.
3d. Coolie Labor -The duty of the American work-
ingmen in the crisis.
4th. Is it practicable to organize a National Board
of Arbitration?
5th. Homes- And the best means to secure them.
Ill
IRA STEWARD AND THE HOURS OF LABOR
INTRODUCTION
The eight-hour movement probably began in 1842,
when the carpenters and caulkers in the Charlestown
navy yard secured eight hours on old work. The
organized caulkers adopted the shorter day by vote in
May, 1854. Various labor organizations followed this
example, but it was not until after 1863 that the interest
in the movement appeared in the organization of soci-
eties having for their sole object the establishment of the
shorter day for all classes of labor.. These originated in
the vicinity of Boston, but spread rapidly to the middle
west, and even to New Orleans and San Francisco. The
list of these societies includes the Workingmen's Con-
vention, Boston Labor Reform Association (the only
one to be incorporated) , the Grand Eight Hour League,
Boston Eight Hour League, New England Reform As-
sociation, and many local and state leagues.
The cause was supported by those who feared that the
return of the soldiers to the industrial world at the close
of the war boded ill for wage-earners unless something
were done to prevent the reduction of wages which
would naturally follow. They, therefore, urged upon
the country the necessity of establishing the eight-hour
day. But to Ira Steward belongs the credit of placing
the argument upon a more enduring basis, the standard
of living. Two tasks lay before him : to convince work-
ingmen that wages would not suffer with the reduction
of hours ; and to show employers that the higher standard
of living would create an increased demand for all com-
278 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
modities, and hence would not injure the employer's in-
terests.
In July, 1862, Congress had enacted a law providing
that the hours and wages of employees in government
navy yards should conform as closely as possible to those
of similar private establishments.- 37th congress, second
session, chap, i, section 8. This, the Court of Claims
declared, was intended to prevent disturbance of the
prevailing rate of wages in the vicinity; but since the
eight-hour day prevailed among ship-carpenters and
caulkers, it virtually established the same for the gov-
ernment navy yards. During the period from 1865 to
1867, there were introduced into Congress numerous
bills and resolutions providing for the eight-hour day
on all government work; but not until June, 1868, did
such a bill become law.-4Oth congress, second ses-
sion, chap. 72. In 1867 Illinois, Missouri, New York,
and Wisconsin passed eight-hour laws -that of Wiscon-
sin applying to women only-but in no case was the law
enforced. Bills were presented to the legislatures of
several other states in that year, but were not adopted.
City councils early took up the matter, and in September,
1865, Boston adopted the eight-hour day for employees
in the city offices. Baltimore first adopted eight hours
for all city employees, except on work done by contrac-
tors; and by the end of the same year, 1866, Aurora (Il-
linois), Evansville (Indiana), Detroit, New York, and
Chicago had passed similar ordinances.
i. THE FIRST EFFORT, 1863
Leaflet; also Fincher's Trades' Review, Dec. 2, 1863. Ira Steward was
a member of the Machinists' and Blacksmiths' Union, and the follow-
ing resolutions were adopted by that organization at his instance.
To THE BOSTON TRADES' ASSEMBLY: At the last
regular annual session of the International Union of
Machinists and Blacksmiths of North America, holden
in Boston, the following preamble and resolves were
passed by a unanimous vote, to wit:
We, the members of the I.U. of Machinists and Black-
smiths of N.A., conscious that our attempts to adjust the
false relations still existing between labor and capital
have failed thus far in consequence of a want of means
adequate to the accomplishment of our ends; therefore
RESOLVED, that from east to west, from north to south,
the most important change to us as working men, to
which all else is subordinate, is a permanent reduction
to eight of the hours exacted for each day's work.
RESOLVED, that since this cannot be accomplished un-
til a public sentiment has been educated, both among
employers and employees, we will use all the ma-
chinery of agitation, whether it be among those of the
religious, political, reformatory or moneyed enterprises
of the day; and to secure such reduction we pledge our
money and our courage.
RESOLVED, that such reduction will never be made un-
til over-work, as a system, is prohibited, nor until it is
universally recognized that an increase of hours is a re-
duction of wages, even if the over hours are paid'for by
extra compensation, unless in those very rare cases where
an uncommon and an unexpected press of work renders
2 go AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
any other arrangement impossible ; and we do not rank
among such exceptions the case of capitalists anxious to
avoid further investment of capital, and hence seeking
through extra hours to benefit themselves by throwing
undue burdens on the laborer.
RESOLVED, that a Reduction of Hours is an Increase
of Wages.
RESOLVED, that it is the duty of this association to se-
lect some person competent to urge these views on pub-
lic attention through the press, and lecture-room, and to
secure him fair remuneration.
In accordance with this vote the undersigned were
appointed a special committee, with full power and dis-
cretion to select some person to whom a systematic agita-
tion of our cause should be confided, and to draw from
the treasury of the Machinists' and Blacksmiths' Unions
the sum of four hundred dollars, as soon as an assessment
can be made and collected, and to commence the enter-
prise on or before January i, 1864.
The selection of a Committee of three Boston dele-
gates, members of the Trades' Assembly, and, in accord-
ance with remarks made in convention and entertained
by general consent, suggests a union between the Boston
Trades' Assembly and the International Union of Ma-
chinists and Blacksmiths in this movement; and it is for
the express purpose of proposing a union between the
two organizations, on equal terms, in this plan for a sys-
tematic agitation of measures necessary for labor to
adopt, that we present this communication and ask for
it your serious and thorough consideration.
IRA STEWARD, JAMES C. BAKER, CHESTER R. MERRILL.
Boston, Nov. 17, 1863.
The Trades' Assembly of Boston in response to the
International Union of Machinists and Blacksmiths of
North America-
THOMAS PHILLIPS IRA STEWARD
Shoemaker. Leading coopera- Machinist. Philosopher of Eight-
tionist since 1862
hour movement
JOHN SAMUEL
Glass bottle blower. Enthusi-
astic cooperationist. Participant
in labor movement since 1834
(From a photograph taken in
1907 in his ninety-first year)
GEORGE E. MCNEILL
Shoemaker. President, Boston
Eight-hour League, and first
Deputy of Massachusetts Bu-
reau of Labor, 1869-1873. Apos-
tle of Eight-hour movement
THE HOURS OF LABOR 283
RESOLVED ist, that a reduction of the number of hours
for a day's work, be the cardinal point to which our
movement ought to be directed ; that we make this point
with the understanding that it is not antagonistic with
capital, while at the same time it invests our cause with
the dignity and power of a great moral and social re-
form, and that it is every way worthy of the sympathy
and co-operation of the most progressive and liberal
thinkers of the age, and that the time has fully arrived
in which to commence a thorough and systematic agita-
tion of this, the leading point in the great problem of
labor reform.
RESOLVED 2d, that we recommend to the unions of
Boston and vicinity the scheme proposed by the machin-
ists and blacksmiths of the International Union, of unit-
ing in the enterprise of paying some one to devote his
whole time to our cause, and that the sum of four hun-
dred dollars be for this purpose assessed and collected
and entrusted to a committee of three to be appointed by
the Trades' Assembly to act in concert with the com-
mittee from the International Union of Machinists and
Blacksmiths.
2. "A REDUCTION OF HOURS AN INCREASE
OF WAGES"
Pamphlet by Ira Steward, published by the Boston Labor Reform Asso-
ciation, 1865; also appears in Fincher's Trades' Review, Oct. 14, 1865.
"Well," says a workingman, "I should certainly be
very glad to work less hours, but I can scarcely earn
enough by working ten to make myself and family com-
fortable."
Sir, as strange as it may seem to you at first blush, it is
a fact that your wages will never be permanently in-
creased until the hours of labor are reduced. Have you
never observed that those who work the hardest and
longest are paid the least, especially if the employment
is very disagreeable, while those whose employment is
more agreeable usually receive more, and many who do
nothing receive more than either?
You are receiving your scanty pay precisely because
you work so many hours in a day, and my point now is
to show why this is true, and why reducing the hours for
the masses will eventually increase their wages.
It is but little more than three hundred years since
everybody believed that the sun revolved around the
earth. But Copernicus finally exploded this mistake
and proved that the earth goes around the sun ; and many
have been the cases in which men have been forced to ad-
mit that the truth was exactly the reverse of all their
past opinions or experiences.
For the safety of society English law made two hun-
dred crimes punishable with death. Thoughtful men
said, "We shall be safer if we reduce these to fifty."
Parliament tried the experiment, and its wonderful sue-
THE HOURS OF LABOR 285
cess suggests a still greater reduction, and to-day Lord
John Russell says, "Abolish the death penalty alto-
gether."
Men once believed that the use of railroads would
leave little work for horses to do. When Sir Rowland
Hill first made the statement that reducing the postage
on letters would increase the revenue, it met with the
same incredulous reception we shall meet in the proposi-
tion that as the hours are reduced wages will increase
until every producer shall receive the full value of his
services.
The truth is, as a rule, that men who labor excessively
are robbed of all ambition to ask for anything more than
will satisfy their bodily necessities, while those who la-
bor moderately have time to cultivate tastes and create
wants in addition to mere physical comforts. How can
men be stimulated to demand higher wages when they
have little or no time or strength to use the advantages
which higher wages can buy, or procure?
Take an extreme case for illustration of this -that of
an average operative or mechanic employed by a cor-
poration fourteen hours a day. His labor commences at
half-past four in the morning, and does not cease until
half-past seven, p.m. How many newspapers or books
can he read? What time has he to visit or receive visits?
to take baths? to write letters? to cultivate flowers? to
walk with his family? Will he not be quite as likely to
vote in opposition to his real interests as in favor? What
is his opinion good for? Will any one ask his advice?
Which will he most enjoy, works of art, or rum? Will
he go to meeting on Sunday? Does society care whether
he is happy or miserable? sick or well? dead or alive?
How often are his eyes tempted by the works of art?
His home means to him his food and his bed. His life
286 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
is work, with the apparition, however, of some time be-
ing without, for his work means bread ! "Only that and
nothing more." He is debased by excessive toil 1 He is
almost without hopel
Think how monotonous that path leading from house
to factory, and from factory to house again -the same
sidewalk every day, rain or shine, summer or winter-
leading by the same low houses -inhabited by beings
walking the same social treadmill as himself. Half-
past seven comes at last, and as the wheel stops he catches
his coat, and half staggering with fatigue, hurries home-
ward in the darkness, thinking of nothing but food and
rest. What are his motives?
From the fourteen hour system let us turn to that of
eight hours for a day's work, and see if the real secret of
low and high wages does not lie in the vast difference
which the two systems make in the daily habits and ways
of living of the masses. In the eight hour system labor
commences at seven o'clock a.m., and, as an hour and a
half is allowed for dinner, the labor of the day ends at
half past four in the afternoon, instead of half-past seven
in the evening. Think carefully of the difference be-
tween the operative and mechanic leaving his work at
half-past seven (after dark, the most of the year), and
that of the more leisurely walk home at half-past four
p.m., or three hours earlier. Remember also that there
is a vast difference in the strength and feelings of those
who commence labor at half-past four in the morning,
and those who commence two hours and a half later, or
at seven o'clock. It is the hard practical necessary dif-
ferences between the two systems which control the daily
habits and thoughts of all who are living under them.
You can hardly dwell too long upon this point, for
upon it turns this whole question of social science -pov-
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 287
erty and wealth -vice and virtue -ignorance and knowl-
edge. The follies, burdens, and crimes of our later civ-
ilization are hanging upon this question, and the tempta-
tion to leave the simple, and comparatively unimportant
fact that reducing the hours will increase the wages, and
launch out upon broader and more sublime results, is
almost irresistible. The simple increase of wages is the
first step on that long road which ends at last in a more
equal distribution of the fruits of toil. For wages will
continue to increase until the capitalist and laborer are
one. But we must confine ourselves to the first simple
fact that a reduction of hours is an increase of wages;
and when we are perfectly satisfied of its soundness we
can build upon it until the consequences grow to the ex-
tent of our comprehension or imagination.
Think then of the difference which will soon be ob-
served in a man or woman emancipated by the eight
hour system from excessive toil! Not the first day nor
the first week, perhaps, but in a very little while. The
first feeling may be one merely of simple relief ; and the
time for a while may be spent, as are many of the Sab-
baths, by the overworked, in sleeping and eating, and
frequently in the most debasing amusements. The use
which a man makes of his leisure, depends largely upon
the use which has been made of him. If he has been
abused, he will be pretty sure to abuse his first oppor-
tunities. An hour, in the hands of John Quincy Adams,
meant a golden opportunity -in the hands of a New-
castle collier it means debauchery -and in the hands of
a New England operative, an hour extra will mean the
difference balanced, or divided between the two.
Many make the mistake of supposing that leisure will
be abused by workingmen, as if leisure of itself were
necessarily corrupting. Leisure, however, is neither
288 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
positively good, or bad. Leisure, or time is a blank -a
negative -a piece of white paper upon which we stamp,
picture, or write, our past characters. If we have been
soured and disappointed by a life of poverty and drudg-
ery, if opportunities have been few and far between, if
education has been neglected, and habits of thought and
observation have not been cultivated -if we have inher-
ited qualities which are ever leading us into temptation,
we shall be sure to stamp this humiliating record upon
the first leisure hour in the eight hour system. The
most of men will make a clumsy use of any thing which
they have not become familiar with. Progress in the
arts and sciences is marked by a line of accidents, burn-
ings, explosions, losses, and deaths, to which we may
liken the abuse of the laborer's first opportunities. But
the remedy is not in depriving him of his chance to ex-
periment.
The charge that men will abuse the privilege of more
leisure, is the objection continually urged against liberty,
and the answer to the latter will probably be a sufficient
reply to the former. Macaulay says :
There is only one cure for the evils which newly acquired freedom
produces and that cure is Freedom ! When a prisoner leaves his cell,
he cannot bear the light of day - he is unable to discriminate colors or
recognize faces. But the remedy is not to remand him to his dungeon,
but to accustom him to the rays of the sun. The blaze of truth and
liberty may at first dazzle and bewilder nations which have become
half-blind in the house of bondage. But let them gaze on, and they
will soon be able to bear it. In a few years men learn to reason. The
extreme violence of opinion subsides. Hostile theories correct each
other. The scattered elements of truth cease to conflict, and begin to
coalesce. And at length a system of justice and order is educed out of
chaos. Many politicians of our time are in the habit of laying it down
as a self-evident proposition, that no people ought to be free till they
are fit for freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story,
who resolved not to go into the water till he had learned to swim. If
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 289
men are to wait for liberty till they become wise and good in slavery,
they may indeed wait forever.
The fact is that when men are abused by a system they
will criticise the system ; and when they abuse an oppor-
tunity, they will soon learn to criticise themselves 1 John
Stuart Mill says:
The secret for developing man, is to give him many duties to per-
form and many inducements to perform them.
Mankind will be virtuous and happy when they have
full power to choose between good and evil, with plenty
of motives for deciding right. Men will not abuse
power when they are made responsible for its abuse.
While therefore giving the masses more time will give
them increased power to do wrong, the motives to do
right will increase very much faster.
Assuming that the leisure we propose is not so posi-
tively debasing, let us return to the main question. My
theory is, ist. That more leisure, will create motives and
temptations for the common people to ask for more
wages.
ad. That where all ask for more wages, there will be
no motive for refusing, since employers will all fare
alike.
3d. That where all demand more wages, the demand
cannot be resisted.
4th. That resistance would amount to the folly of a
"strike" by employers themselves, against the strongest
power in the world, viz., the habits, customs, and opin-
ions, of the masses.
5th. That the change in the habits and opinions of the
people through more leisure will be too gradual to dis-
turb or jar the commerce and enterprise of capital.
6th. That the increase in wages will fall upon the
wastes of society, in its crimes, idleness, fashions, and
29 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
monopolies, as well as the more legitimate and honorable
profits of capital, in the production and distribution of
wealth, and
7th. In the mechanical fact, that the cost of making
an article depends almost entirely upon the number man-
ufactured is a practical increase of wages, by tempting
the workers through their new leisure to unite in buying
luxuries now confined to the wealthy, and which are
costly because bought only by the wealthy.
The first point in this theory is the vital one "that
more leisure will create motives and temptations for the
most ordinary laborer to insist upon higher wages." A
few, comparatively, insist upon more pay now, but they
are in competition with the great body of laborers who
do not, and who never will, until, in the language of
John Stuart Mill, "a change has been wrought in their
ideas and requirements."
There is a law or two in this case which proves, on
examination, to be a blessing in disguise. The law is
first, that if one employer pays for the same quality and
quantity of labor enough more than another that his
business will be ruined, and his workmen finally thrown
out of employment; and second, that if a workman of
superior tendencies to the majority of his fellows, is not
paid more than they for performing the same kind of
labor his general influence and his opportunities for
usefulness will be cramped and limited accordingly.
The blessing in disguise is this -the necessity created by
these two laws, of elevating all who labor! Every la-
borer in rags, is a walking admonition to those who are
not: for he says, unconsciously of course, "I must con-
tinue to labor for what my rags cost, until I am placed
in a position where I am ashamed to wear them ; and as
long as I am paid only enough to buy rags, you cannot
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 291
be paid much more; so please help me up!" Every
laborer who saves rent by living in crowded tenement
houses, narrow alleys and unhealthy localities, can un-
derbid the few who will not live in them. Parents who do
not educate their children, but send them into factories
and shops, can underbid those who do. Men who do not
marry can underbid those who do. The charm of the
eight hour system is, that it gives time and opportunity
for the ragged -the unwashed -the ignorant and ill-
mannered, to become ashamed of themselves and their
standing in society.
One of the first steps in reformation is, to make a man
feel as keenly as possible, the meanness of his position
or of his behaviour. The masses must be made discon-
tented with their situation, by furnishing them with the
leisure necessary to go about and observe the dress, man-
ners, surroundings, and influence of those whose wealth
furnishes them with leisure. Wealthy people have no
interest in contrasting their situation with the poor, for
this reason; that it is the extreme poverty of the masses,
which makes the ease and leisure of the wealthy possible.
When every one has a fortune to let, no one will hire.
Imagine such a state of things for a moment; every man
going up and down the street, crying at the top of his
voice, "I have money to loan at six per cent interest, who
wants to hire?" and the only answer they will receive
will be, "I too have money to let; I don't want to hire,
for men who pay interest on money have to work or get
others to work for them, and every man I meet works for
himself, and if no one hires my money I shall have to
work for myself." Of course the wealthy, as a class, are
not going about, giving to every poor man a hint of "the
good time coming," when their capital will mean the
tools merely, with which they will earn their own living!
292 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
This is a matter for clear headed workingmen to dis-
cuss, and the eight hour reduction will give them the
time necessary, and other questions follow: but mean-
time this leisure is still more necessary, to supply some
motive for exertion for the most thoughtless and heed-
less of laborers -motives which they can appreciate and
will struggle for, until educated up to an interest in mat-
ters of real importance. Till this is done, they will be
found, every election day, in company with master cap-
italists, voting down schemes for their own emancipa-
tion ! Capital, with swift enterprise, can pay for herald-
ing to the ears of ignorance favorite catch-words, while
its control of the daily press and party machinery leaves
the intelligent workingman, of slender means, in a mor-
tifying minority. Think of it, you mechanics, who af-
fect a social distinction between the uncultivated laborer
and yourself ; on election day the capitalist and the com-
mon laborer unite and vote you down, and the rest of
the year you and the shrewder capitalist unite and keep
down and away from you the "common and unclean"
laborer. Hasten the day when we shall hear no more of
any honorable industry being "common or unclean," for
We march to fate abreast.
The eight hour system will make a coalition between
ignorant labor and selfish capital on election day, im-
possible.
When an intelligent workingman applies for employ-
ment, he don't want to meet a fellow laborer offering to
do about the same thing for fifty or seventy-five cents
less per day; yet he will be there "every time" until
allowed the leisure necessary to be reached through his
low pride or envy, if nothing higher, by wife, children,
neighbors, and society generally. Give the masses time
to come together and they cannot be kept apart; for man
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 293
is a social being; and when they come together expenses
multiply, because the inferior will struggle to imitate
the superior in many things which cost. To see is to
desire, from babyhood to old age; to desire is to strug-
gle, and to struggle is to succeed, sooner or later.
Imagine operatives or laborers of average capacity
leaving work at half-past four; they are liable to meet
those whose good opinion is worth everything to them,
and they think that a neat personal appearance is pos-
itively necessary; and it must be confessed that, while
fine clothes do not make a man, we all look at them as a
certain sort of index to his character.
Men who are governed only by their pride, are low
indeed ; but those who have no pride at all, are very much
lower. We must take human nature as we find it; hop-
ing and believing that the era of personal display will
be succeeded by one of mental and moral accomplish-
ment. A valuable point has been gained in pushing the
man into a position where he is made to feel the imper-
ative necessity of dress, and for this he will struggle.
An operative running from the shop in the evening tired,
hungry, and unwashed, has not time to be ashamed of
his personal appearance; and our modern laborer pass-
ing through the streets at six, has not time and strength
enough: but the improvement which has been made in
the personal appearance of ten hour laborers, over those
of the twelve and fourteen hour system, is suggestive of
what two hours more of leisure may soon accomplish.
A man who is satisfied with his personal appearance,
will be likely to go abroad and take his wife and children,
and they must have "something to wear." If he visits,
he must receive visits, and what will visitors say if his
house and its surroundings do not look as respectable
as other folks 7 ?
294 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Many things can be done for self, family, and domicil
which cost nothing but time and labor; but when done,
are sure to suggest one or two things more, costing
money. There is time after eight hours' labor to attend
an evening concert, which adds a little to the expense,
but much to the enjoyment of the family. The Smiths
and Jones "and everybody" are going, u and who wants
to be so different from everybody else." If these are
trivial considerations to intelligent minds, they are the
only ones which can be brought to bear upon the masses
to tempt them to bid for higher wages. The great ma-
jority of men and women must "act like other folks."
"What will people think?" or "What will people say?"
is the most terrible question which they can be asked.
There are not many in society who have the courage
to stand up alone and be very much different from their
neighbors or acquaintances. In a good cause a few
brave men and women will live and die all alone ;
Forlorn, forlorn, bearing the scorn
Of the meanest of mankind.
They are sustained -God bless them -by something
the masses know not of. Even these few braves, how-
ever, betray this principle, or quality, in human nature,
and generally honor, with extra precision, all customs,
forms, and niceties, of their day and generation, not
positively opposed to their special ideas: they "render
unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's ; and unto God
the things that are God's."
Some children drop their playthings sooner than oth-
ers, and the amusements of later years last certain minds
longer than others; but so thoroughly aroused am I to
the necessity of something for every human being to
enjoy, that I cry out reverently "God bless every baby
pleased with a rattle." Tempt every producer of wealth
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 295
then, by theatres, concerts, fine clothes, stories; and the
leisure to enjoy, and the higher wages necessary to sup-
port them, will, by wiser fellows, be used to study politi-
cal economy, social science, the sanitary condition of
the people, the prevention of crime, woman's wages,
war, and the ten thousand schemes with which our age
teems for the amelioration of the condition of man.
In other words, intelligent workers, if you want ten
dollars to invest in some scientific, reformatory, reli-
gious or literary scheme, you must see to it that every one
who performs your kind of labor, wants something,
which will cost as much! And those who are tempted
to leave their own occupation because they are under-
paid, and to learn yours, must have the temptation re-
moved by a rise in their wages.
An extra hod-carrier may become a poor mason, and
his wages, higher than those paid to hod-carriers, may
still be the means of bringing down the price of skillful
masons. An extra striker may raise his wages by at-
tempting the trade of blacksmithing; and yet be the
means of bringing down the price of those who have
never done anything else but forge. It pays employers
to teach the trade or the business to the uninitiated, as
soon as the wages of the skillful run up to a certain point.
It may be urged that a hod-carrier or a striker is not
worth as much as a mason or a blacksmith, but who shall
decide how much this labor is really worth? Building
houses and forging iron would come to an end if there
were no hod-carriers, or strikers, and what more can be
said for the trade of the mason or blacksmith? You
say there are a plenty who are glad to carry the hod or
wait upon the blacksmith. There is a plenty of water,
gravel, iron; but none the less valuable are they?
Without attempting to settle, definitely, how much
296 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
common labor is worth -for it is a broad question -I
will make the claim that no man's compensation should
be so low, that it will not secure for himself and family
a comfortable home -education for his children, and all
of the influence to which he is entitled by his capacity,
virtue, and industry. As the present system of labor
does not pay a majority of workers enough, we may con-
clude that something is wrong: and whatever our specu-
lations upon the system, it must be clear that the masses
will not insist upon more pay, without additional mo-
tives and temptations; and that all who do the work of
the masses must receive their pay. When William H.
Seward serves a blacksmith he must not expect to be
paid more than strikers generally receive; and the ques-
tion for him to ask, if he complains, is, "why is it that
so many can be found willing to labor for such low
wages?" Mr. Seward can only raise his wages as a
striker, by throwing all who do this kind of labor into a
position where they will feel the necessity of more pay.
Change and improve the daily habits of the laborers and
they will raise their own pay in spite of any power in the
universe; and this can only be done by furnishing them
with more leisure, or time! We must remember that
by an inexorable law of self-interest, we are bound to
lift up the lowest and most degraded laborer.
Weaker is your soaring
When they cease to fly.
We never shall occupy comfortable and healthy dwell-
ings until they are well out of their hovels, tenement-
houses and cellars, and they will never come out of them
until leisure has opened their eyes to their own shame
and filth.
With three hundred and sixty-five days of oppor-
tunities created by the eight hour system we can say to
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 297
the laborer, "Your industry helps to support that mon-
opoly or abuse, and the man you voted for at the last
election helped to make that abuse possible." He has
time to listen, digest and plan.
If our eight hour friends in Boston, New-York and
Philadelphia would make this the issue at their next
city elections -that no laborer employed by those cities
shall work longer than eight hours per day, and that they
shall have the usual wages, they would discover its im-
mense importance by observing the tenacity with which
the moneyed interests would oppose the movement. The
establishment of the eight hour system in those three
cities would be an eight hour "Sermon on the Mount."
Twelve hundred common laboring men, agitating the
eight hour question, and carrying it into cellars or by-
places never reached by any sound but a trumpet blast
from capital on election day! This terrible reservoir
of cheap labor must be run off, and the motives which
prompt us to its accomplishment are not unlike those
which we shall present to a certain class above us social-
ly -to those whose wealth is invested in untaxed govern-
ment bonds. We shall say to them: "Gentlemen, the
repudiation of the national debt is threatened by the
unprincipled and the ignorant. Emancipate the great
industrial classes of America from excessive toil, and
you create a bulwark of popular intelligence against
which the threats of repudiation will dash in vain for-
ever. The overworked and under-paid are dangerous
enough in any country, but especially so in America,
where they have votes. A word to the wise is sufficient."
Louis Napoleon will never trust his system of oppres-
sion under the searching, steady gaze of workers emanci-
pated from excessive toil. The despotisms of Europe
would crumble faster than ever under such a scrutiny.
298 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Alas! the advantages within the grasp of American
workers if they only knew of them, and of each others'
co-operation.
In the eight hour system a dollar will be worth more
than a dollar in the long hour system -not immediately,
of course -but in a comparatively short time. The rea-
son of this lies in the fact which every good mechanic
understands, that the cost of making an article depends
almost entirely on the number manufactured. It pays
to build elaborate machinery, to manufacture something
which every one will buy; while those who make the
manufacture a study will improve upon their machinery
and reduce the cost continually, especially if in compe-
tition with others equally anxious to produce something
which everybody wants. One of the reasons why a
calendar clock, for instance, or an oval picture frame,
or a law book, costs so much is because so few buy. While
a common clock, excursion tickets, water-pails and
Bibles are wanted by everybody, and are cheapened
accordingly; and when everybody can be made to feel
that they must have certain luxuries now confined to the
wealthy, they will be cheapened accordingly. How
much do you imagine a single copy of the Atlantic
Monthly or of Our Young Folks would cost if bought
by ten times their present number of subscribers? One
could spend hours in describing the saving which this
patronage would make in the manufacture of those pub-
lications alone. Meantime you who will buy the At-
lantic or Our Young Folks, are paying the present prices
because there are so many who will not buy at all. Your
loss is doubled ; they keep your wages down because they
do without these publications, and keep the prices of
these publications up, because they do without them.
Here then is an increase of wages, practically, at the
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 299
expense of no one; and the general fact that much of
the increase is to fall upon the wastes of society, caused
by its idleness, crimes, fashions, and accidents at last,
and that the increase will be very gradual, ought to dis-
arm all opposition.
Meantime the temptation to fraud and idleness will
be measurably lessened by the removal, through the
reduction of hours and the increase of wages, of the
burdens upon labor. I put the question to any man
who thinks: "Is labor honored and respected? Is
Henry Wilson respected because he did make shoes, or
because he does not? Are Abraham Lincoln, Andrew
Johnson, and N. P. Banks honored because they once
toiled with their hands, or because they were fortunate
enough to lift themselves into a position where it was
no longer necessary? Is labor in the shop, or on the
farm, ten and twelve hours a day, the place for a man
anxious to exert an influence upon the questions of the
hour? When labor is honored, idleness will be dis-
honored. The courts of justice and state prisons of our
land are less feared and dreaded as possible contin-
gencies, than are its farms and workshops, by the more
intelligent class. Can we wonder then, that crimes in
legislation are increasing -that ten thousand applica-
tions are on file in the treasury department, at Washing-
ton, for clerkships -that there are six applications for
every situation in the Boston custom house -that every
fourth year there is a grand national scramble for the
post offices of the United States?
This system, however, falls the most crushingly upon
woman by lowering her wages to the starvation point,
and sending her onto the streets of all our large cities and
towns for bread! The horrors of the middle passage,
which an advancing civilization has consigned to eter-
3 oo AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
nal infamy, are here repeated and magnified on a large
scale in the present labor system. Women elbowing
women - aggravating each others difficulties, and creat-
ing a system of abominations which cannot be described.
Small compensation, however, explains all this.
Because, fathers are paid low wages they send their
children -who ought to be at school -into factories and
shops, to do cheaply, what women ought to be fairly
paid for doing. Because, husbands are underpaid, they
consent that their wives may crowd the labor market, in
competition with maidens who have no husbands to make
up for their low wages. And because single men are
not paid enough for their daily labor, they do not marry ;
and thus the maidens who ought to be married, and the
wives who ought to be out of the labor market and at-
tending to themselves and families, and the children
who ought to be at school, are bringing down woman's
wages until her cry of want and despair is splitting the
ears of the nation ! It is fashionable to sympathize with
the "poor sewing girl," but when will men dare to go
to the root of the difficulty?
Presenting the foregoing as a mere fragment of the
argument, proving that a reduction of hours is an in-
crease of wages, I submit, in conclusion, that the "in-
crease" does not mean an increase of the price of the
article produced, as do the "strikes" for higher wages,
when successful. In a reduction of hours the producer
and the consumer will come together more frequently
and stay longer, and the knowledge they will exchange
will commence melting and dividing between them the
profits of capital. The capitalist, as we now under-
stand him, is to pass away with the kings and royalties
of the past. In America, every man is king in theory,
and will be in practice eventually, and in the good time
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 301
coming every man will be a capitalist. The capitalist
of to-day, however, is as necessary as was the king once,
to preserve order. Nothing but a higher standard of
popular intelligence can supersede the necessity of the
one man power. The eight hour system will put the
man who made the shoes, and the man who bought them,
together; and they will compare the prices paid for
the labor, and the sale of the shoes ; and observing the
great difference, will begin to think 1 This thought and
its consequences melts back into the hands which pro-
duced it, the wealth of the world. It means anti-pauper-
ism, anti-aristocracy, anti-monopoly, anti-slavery, anti-
prostitution, anti-crime, want, waste, and idleness; and
the vast moral and material consequences flowing from
such a conference justify the legislation necessary to se-
cure the time.
3 . PLAN OF ACTION
Resolutions offered by Ira Steward and adopted at a mass meeting at
Faneuil Hall, Nov. 2, 1865, following an address by Wendell Phil-
lips. For Phillips's address see his Speeches, Lectures, and Letters,
second series (Boston, 1891), 139-144; and Daily Evening Voice,
Nov. 3, 1865.
RESOLVED, that the next great step for American
statesmanship is the adoption of measures which shall
make it impossible for capital or corporations to de-
prive the laborer, against his will, of the time and op-
portunity necessary to study the institutions of his coun-
try, or the great questions of the age; and that the "right
of the people to keep and bear arms," which our fathers
solemnly recognized eighty years ago as one security
against the possible usurpations of government, now
finds its parallel in our later necessity of additional se-
curity against the corruptions and usurpations of cap-
ital, through its control of the literature, politics, and
daily press of the country.
RESOLVED, that the practical measure for American
statesmanship to adopt is the national, state and munici-
pal legislation and action necessary to secure a reduc-
tion of the hours of labor to eight per day.
RESOLVED, that the legislation necessary to secure this
is:
i st A law making eight hours a legal day's labor in
the absence of a written agreement, said agreement not
to hold good longer than the first day of the January
following.
2d. A law prohibiting any company incorporated by
the laws of this state from employing laborers or oper-
atives more than eight hours a day.
THE HOURS OF LABOR 303
3d. A law forbidding the employment of minors, un-
der eighteen years of age, more than eight hours a day.
4th. A law forbidding the employment of minors
under eighteen years of age after eight o'clock in the
evening, or before four o'clock in the morning.
5th. The appointment of commissioners with full
power to investigate and prosecute all violations.
6th. Resolutions instructing our senators and repre-
sentatives in Congress to use all their influence to secure
the eight-hour system for all navy yards, arsenals, and
workshops controlled by the United States government;
and
7th. Municipal regulations by the aldermen and
common council, making eight hours a day's labor for
every man employed by the city, or by contractors who
employ help upon work paid for by the city.
RESOLVED, that we most respectfully but earnestly call
upon Hon. Alexander H. Rice and Hon. Samuel P.
Hooper to use their influence to secure the eight hour
system in all national workshops and navy yards, since
its adoption would be of as much significance to the
labor reform movement as was the abolition of slavery
in the District of Columbia to emancipation in 1863.
RESOLVED, that in the coming city election we will ask
but one question of all candidates, viz: "Will you, if
elected, use all your influence to secure the eight-hour
system for every laborer and mechanic employed by the
City of Boston, by contractors or otherwise, and at the
rate of pay usually allowed in the ten-hour system?"
RESOLVED, that American and English legislation has
long since sanctioned all of the principles involved in
these measures, and that the expediency of adopting them
is vindicated by the vast moral and material conse-
quences resulting from a reduction of hours.
3 o 4 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
RESOLVED, that the great material advantage to the
laborer of the eight-hour system is, that it is the only
way by which his wages can ever be permanently in-
creased, without increasing the price of the article pro-
duced -that this increase in the laborers' wages will be
at the expense of the vast wealth of individual capitalist,
and not at the expense of the laboring consumer -that
the simple increase of wages means, the first step on that
long road which ends at last in a more equal distribution
of the fruits of industry, in which the producer and the
capitalist will be one! That as the vast fortunes of
individuals must melt back into the hands which pro-
duced them, under a higher standard of intelligence, so
also must the abuses, monopolies, and illegitimate bur-
dens which the people unconsciously impose upon
themselves - that this means the downfall of a corrupt
moneyed aristocracy, and of its natural counterpart, ex-
treme poverty and pauperism -forcing children, and
wives, and maidens who would be wives if men were
better paid, into the labor market, to elbow down each
other's wages to a point which makes prostitution a
necessity, and furnishing a theatre for the demagogue in
times of financial revulsion -perpetuating the system
which makes such periods inevitable, and which fur-
nishes to traitors at home and enemies abroad the only
basis upon which to found a hope for northern votes in
favor of repudiating the debt of the nation.
RESOLVED, that with grateful hearts we praise our
Heavenly Father that He has permitted his angel of
peace once more to wave her silver wand over our recent-
ly distracted land. That we rejoice that the rebel aris-
tocracy of the South has been crushed, that we rejoice
that beneath the glorious shadow of our victorious flag
men of every clime, lineage and color are recognized as
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 305
free. But while we will bear with patient endurance
the burden of the public debt, we yet want it to be known
that the workingmen of America will in future claim
a more equal share in the wealth their industry creates
in peace and a more equal participation in the privileges
and blessings of those free institutions, defended by their
manhood on many a bloody field of battle. . .
4 . "THE POWER OF THE CHEAPER OVER
THE DEARER"
The manuscript of this article is among those which Ira Steward willed
to Miss Marietta Marshall, of Nantucket Island, and is the only por-
tion of the manuscript for his projected book which Steward had
completed ready for the printer. It was probably written between
the years 1875 and 1879, and summarizes his scattered writings and
addresses on machinery, competition and the standard of living. The
words in brackets are corrections made by the author in the copyist's
manuscript
In the production of wealth, there is a king fact or
law, that rules all others, which may be called the north
star in political economy; and it is this: that cheaper
ways of doing will always succeed against dearer ways.
The cheapness that undersells, is superior to every other
power that exists in human affairs. It is infinitely
stronger than legislation or armies; custom or habit; or
the most absolute despotism. There is nothing but the
distruction of the whole human race, that can prevent
the cheapest products, or the lowest paid producers from
underselling those that are sufficiently costly. There
is but one power that can ever prevail against the cheap-
ness that now undersells and rules every thing; and that
is the superior power of a cheaper cheapness. The
cheapness that exists, can be undersold and driven out of
existence, by still cheaper ways of doing. In other
words if the cheapness that now undersells, can only be
made sufficiently expensive, it can be driven out of the
world! If the cheapest fact [things] can be made to
changes places with the dearest, they will be forced out
of the market by the cheaper ones.
Dearest and cheapest are not absolute or stationary
THE HOURS OF LABOR 307
conditions; they are relative or comparative. If the
cost of the dearest is sufficiently reduced, that which
was cheapest is thereby made dearest; though its orig-
inal price is precisely what it was before its relation was
changed. That which was cheapest may be made dear-
est, if that which was dearest is made sufficiently cheap.
There is perhaps no limit to cheapness in its truest or
best sense ; or to dearness, except the limit to civilization.
But there has always been and probably always will be,
dearer and cheaper methods of production, for the time
being. And whichever way is cheapest, for the time or
place, will undersell every other way; and the ways that
are undersold, are the dearest. The word "dearest"
applies to those ways of doing, that are not practiced for
the reason that they cost more than the ways that prevail ;
and to productions that are not for sale because they
would be undersold if they were. If a seeming cheap-
ness is driven out of the market, it is dearest whenever
and as long as it can be undersold. And the seeming
dearness that drives every thing else from the market
because itundersells,mustbecalledthecheapest. Nothing
but the cheapness that drives, is cheapest. And only
the dearness that is driven, is dear, in the sense these two
words are used here.
The most of mankind will naturally pay the fewest
dollars and cents necessary to supply their demands.
Very few buyers ever ask whether the way of producing
the products they consume is pleasant or unpleasant,
easy or hard, or who does the work, or where it was
done. If the quality, quantity, and appearance of an
article are satisfactory, they are satisfied to buy of those
who sell cheapest! If those who sell, or produce, could
choose between the hardest and the easier ways of cre-
ating wealth, they would prefer the easier, without re-
308 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
gard to cheapness or expense. But the easiest way for
producers, would be the hardest way for consumers, if
it cost the most money. Consumers or buyers would
find it harder to earn the extra money necessary to pay
high prices, than to pay low ones.
As those who sell are ruled by those who buy, and the
buyers are ruled by the lowest prices, the hardest ways
of producing must prevail, until they can be made the
dearest, and driven out of the market by the power of
the cheapest. The hardest and most disagreeable and
the slowest methods can be driven out of the market and
out of the world, as soon as they are made sufficiently ex-
pensive. In other words the easiest and most agreeable
ways [methods] can only prevail when they undersell
every other.
Patent offices are full of ingenious contrivances for
saving hard and disagreeable labor. But thousands of
patents fail, because the results produced cannot under-
sell more laborious methods. A mechanical success will
fail, unless it also succeeds commercially. If mankind
ever learn how to produce the most abundant wealth,
they will do it in obedience to the power of the cheaper
over the dearer. If they remain in poverty, they will do
so in obedience to the same universal law. In either
case the cheapest will always undersell ; and this fact
governs the whole world.
The wealth which the most machine using or civilized
nations have already produced, is, as far as it goes,
cheaper for them, than poverty. Therefore they have
some wealth. And the poverty of the most barbarous,
or hand labor nations, is cheaper for them, than the
wealth of the most enlightened. Therefore they have
poverty. In each case the cheaper fact lives and rules ;
and is the natural cause of the death of the dearest; but
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 309
which of these two facts, poverty or wealth, shall con-
tinue to be the cheaper, and how wealth can be made
cheaper than poverty, are the coming questions. In
other words, how can poverty be made so much dearer
than wealth, that it will be driven out of the world, so
that no one can afford to remain poor?
There is no natural way of increasing the production
of wealth, except through the power of the cheapest to
undersell the dearest. Artificial plans for increasing
wealth, are hardly worth discussing. Very little, if any
real wealth can ever be produced by them. But the
objections to them will seem clearer, as this statement
proceeds. Artificial plans are worth answering, merely
because they are advocated by people whose sincerity
and earnestness makes them well worth convincing. The
most unproductive and worst ways of doing, and the
lowest paid laborers and their hand made products, can
be driven out of the world as soon as they have been made
sufficiently dear.
Anything that can be made dearer, is helpless. And
any thing made cheaper, is resistless. The forces that
produce the least wealth, should be made dearest, and
those that produce most should be made cheapest. The
most productive forces are natural, the least productive
are human. Human muscular force should be made
dearest, so that it can be driven out of the market, or out
of the world. And natural forces should be made cheap-
est so that they may be brought into the world. Steam
and the law of gravitation, a water fall, or animal power,
electricity, sunshine and rain are natural agencies for
carrying burdens, sending messages, making pictures,
and disseminating knowledge, infinitely swifter and eas-
ier, better and cheaper than can be done by roan's un-
aided muscular exertion. In the rapid production of
3 io AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
wealth, very little can be done by hand labor, or with
tools that require about all the strength and skill of a
human being, to use them. The quality of work done
with such tools is some times excellent, but a great deal
of time and labor is required to produce a very limited
quantity. To employ muscular labor instead of the
great forces of nature, not only means poverty, but the
physical abuse, deformity, and premature decay of the
laborer. This means shorter lives for laborers, and the
loss of their self-possession and self-respect, which does
much to foster the oppressive and absurd idea, that an
inferior or laboring class is necessary to do the world's
hard work; who must tamely submit to the slavish dis-
cipline and lordly authority exercised by a superior
class that is expected to be kind to the poor, if the poor
are good to work. But the logic of this theory of the
producer, is chattel slavery. And slavery means still
more poverty. For slaves produce far less wealth than
any other class that does the world's hard work by hand
labor. Slaveholders were no more oblivious to the pov-
erty of the slave system, than capitalists are to the com-
parative unproductiveness and poverty of an exclusively
laboring class.
And as long as tired human hands do most of the
world's hard work, the sentimental pretense of honoring
and respecting the horny handed toiler is as false and
absurd as the idea that a solid foundation for a house
can be made out of soap bubbles. It is the most offensive
hypocrisy and mockery to pretend to honor an act that
is the physical and moral destruction of the actor. But
when the fingers, nerves and teeth that produce wealth
shall be made of iron, steel, and wire, instead of quiver-
ing flesh and blood, the most laborious man will have
nothing in his employment to prevent his becoming the
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 311
most polished and dignified man. In his personal pres-
ence and bearing he may be more of an Apollo or a Lord
Chesterfield, than the bankers and merchant princes of
today. Servile habits of thought and obedience will no
longer be associated with "hewers of wood, and drawers
of water," although any one of them will hew vastly
more wood, and draw far more water through the agency
of natural forces, than a thousand or ten thousand such
laborers can today.
Natural forces never grow tired; are always ready
when the conditions necessary to employ them are ready;
and to their power to produce wealth abundantly there
is no conceivable limit. It is more common and familiar
to speak of "labor saving machinery" than of the labor
that may be saved by "natural forces," though machinery
and natural forces are practically one and the same. But
"machinery" is the human side of the fact, and "natural
forces" are the Divine side.
The machinery that "pays" represents the precise ex-
tent to which mankind have already applied natural
forces; but the inexhaustible extent to which natural
forces may be applied, cannot be represented by any ma-
chinery that man has ever built. Words representing
perfection like nature, and words representing imperfec-
tion like machinery, can never be used as the exact equiv-
alent of each other. Machinery may represent man's
failures to save labor, as well as his success. But natural
forces never fail.
In human works though labored on with pain,
A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain,
In God's one single can his end produce,
Yet serves to second to some other use.
There is more simplicity in saying "natural forces,"
for into these two words can be crowded and forgotten,
all of the complications and mistakes, confusion and
3 i2 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
variations associated with the word machinery. All of
the locomotives, engines and boilers, the rail-roads,
steam-ships and much of manufacturing, may be nar-
rowed down to the single and simple fact of the natural
power of steam. And the natural fact that water will
run down hill, is sometimes combined with the power
of steam, and made to supply a whole city with water.
Steam will force water to the highest reservoirs, and the
law of gravitation will force it down again, to the low-
est outlets. Intelligent people every where are suffi-
ciently familiar with the fact, that the moving or pro-
ductive power of steam, or of any natural force is vastly
superior to the physical power of a human being.
But how to substitute natural for human power is the
great unanswered question. And the question is not an-
swered when rail-roads, canals, steam ships, water or
gas works are built or run by government. A govern-
mental plan is artificial. The natural plan is to make
human labor so costly, that rail-roads, canals, steam-
ships, water and gas works etc. will be the cheapest way
of doing. Very little if any machinery, or even horse
power can exist in the lowest labor paid countries of the
world, because its results could be undersold by hand
labor. Machinery most prevails where labor is most
highly rewarded; because its results will undersell those
of the most highly paid laborers, if they attempted to do
the same work by hand. Whenever the price of human
labor is sufficiently increased, the poverty of hand labor
can be undersold by the wealth of machinery. And thus
it is, and thus it may [will] be, that wealth becomes
cheaper than poverty. There is no power in the Uni-
verse to prevent the substitution of machinery or natural
forces for hand labor, as fast as the products of ma-
chinery can undersell those of hand labor. But as long
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 313
as the results of hand labor can undersell those of ma-
chinery, there is no power that can substitute machinery
for hand labor. That which undersells, conquers every
thing; whether it is the poverty of human forces, or the
wealth of natural ones. In China, sedan chairs are used
to carry passengers, instead of horses and carriages.
Not because transportation upon men's shoulders is eas-
ier, or more rapid and pleasant than by horse power;
but because there, a man undersells a horse. Where
men are cheaper than horses, the rudest and most humil-
iating contrivances for travel must prevail; to which
royalty itself must bow down. Where the sedan chair
system is so nearly universal, the streets and highways
are too narrow and rough and crooked in most cases for
horses and carriages.
The most of the streets in the city of Canton in China,
are less than eight feet wide. The Emperor of China
can send abroad, and import if he chooses, the most ele-
gant and costly equipages. But if he attempted to make
the roads and streets of his empire wide enough for their
use, it would probably cost him a rebellion, if not the
loss of his throne. He can cut off the heads of thousands
of his subjects, without serious question; but before he
can ride over his dominions by horse and carriage, a
political economy must prevail that will make horses
cheaper than Chinamen.
As it is, the Emperor of China and his subjects are
now governed in their journeys on land by the fact that
the sedan chairists can undersell horses and carriages.
Like his "viceroys" of the provinces, and the nobility,
he must travel mostly by sedan chairs or upon elephants ;
either of which can proceed where carriage wheels can-
not roll, and where streets are too narrow for carriages
to pass each other.
3 i 4 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
The sedan chair is a type of the fact that prevails in
various forms, in the most civilized parts of the world.
Whether in any country the method of doing is pro-
ductive or unproductive, agreeable or disagreeable,
healthy [wholesome] or unhealthy [unwholesome], fast
or slow, is not the question that decides. It is the under-
selling fact or thing that decides. It is no more uncom-
plimentary to the half civilization prevailing in China
to harness a human being to the drudgery that belongs
to a beast or a machine, than is the humiliating and
wasting household drudgery now imposed upon the
women of the most enlightened parts of the world.
But the architecture and conveniences, the sewerage
and plumbing, the steam and other agencies that belong
to a higher domestic civilization, are undersold by the
low paid labor of women. In America a woman is
cheaper than steam, waste pipes and elevators. She
undersells the work that ought to be done better and
easier in a laundry and baking department; and for pre-
cisely the same reason that in China, a man undersells a
horse. To abolish the drudgery of the average New
England kitchen, and to introduce horses, carriages and
machinery into China, are essentially the same problem,
to be solved upon the same principle; and are destined
to meet with the same narrow objections.
In the simple power of the cheaper over the dearer, is
contained the Divine or natural plan for making the
selfishness of men serve each other, as soon as the wealth
and intelligence of the more advanced part of them,
have given them the power to lift up the rest of the race.
When selfishness is sufficiently enlightened, it discovers
that its own personal interests cannot be very well
served, without serving others. The universal power
of the cheapest, makes it absolutely impossible for any
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 315
part of the human race, to rise very much higher than
the rest.
It is somewhat troublesome for the highest to pause
in their pleasures, and lift up the lowest; but they will
be rewarded with more wealth if they do, and be pun-
ished with more poverty if they do not. Nature provides
the lowest animals with some sort of power or weapon
for self defence, with which to fight the battle of life.
It would be strange therefore if every human being how-
ever feeble, or ignorant, or far removed from the rest
of mankind, were not equally well armed against the
rich and strong and selfish. In the simple power of the
cheapest, may be found the most deadly and effective
weapon that nature could invent, to place in the hands
of the heathen and outcasts of human society.
Among brutes, the powers given for defense or attack,
are for the moment merely, when they see and meet each
other. But between human beings, a far more subtle
and curious relation exists, by which they may bless, or
punish each other, even if they live ten thousand miles
apart, and are ignorant of each other's existence; or of
this penalty for forgetting the brotherhood of the en-
tire human race. Men, need not meet each other, like
animals, for attack. The way for a man to attack a man,
is to forget him!
This is the wicked, cruel and unrepented attack that
the world's civilization is now making upon more than
a thousand millions of the human race. But the retali-
ation for this neglect is as remorseless and effective as
any penalty ever visited by nature upon man's trans-
gressions.
The poor and ignorant heathen in far off lands cannot
raise armies nor create navies to visit the more advanced
nations of the world and destroy their wealth and com-
3 1 6 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
merce. But they do us infinitely more harm; for
they place limits, far beyond our power to estimate or
comprehend, upon the wealth we might otherwise cre-
ate for ourselves, if they had not been selfishly and wick-
edly forgotten. For they can and do work for wages
that undersell ours. Low paid labor is the power blind-
ly and unconsciously exercised by hundreds of millions
of laborers in China, India, Africa and elsewhere, upon
the more highly paid labor of America and England, or
of Germany and France.
Fifty years ago, the power of the cheapest was not
"world wide" as it is today. The opposite sides of the
globe have not, until recently, been brought into buying
and selling relations ; and could not be, until the cost of
transportation had been sufficiently reduced, and the
wealth to pay for transportation had been enough in-
creased, to make the products of our home labor dearer
than those which could be obtained from the other side
of the globe. When the point had at last been reached
where it would pay to send to the uttermost parts of the
earth for low paid laborers or their products, then the
most highly paid labor of the world began to pay its
first penalty for the existence of low paid laborers any
where. Abundant work, high wages, or more wealth,
are the great inducements for most people to leave the
homes of their childhood, and migrate to other parts of
the world. This explains most of the world's emigra-
tion to America, which by 1830, had developed itself
sufficiently to attract millions of Europeans to our
shores.
A very few people, one in thousands perhaps, were
drawn here from a positive love for political and re-
ligious freedom. But this kind of emigration is excep-
tional, and came most when our country was poor.
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 317
While the few people who came to America from an
abstract love of liberty, and the many who came to get a
better living, were the natural complements of each
other, the ideas and motives of these two classes of emi-
grants have been so mixed or embellished, that our
"Fourth of July" way of putting things eloquently repre-
sents millions of people fleeing from "European oppres-
sion." But this is a "fancy" statement of the case; for
nearly all of them have fled, as they feel the fact, from
European poverty! Very few of them came over for an
idea! The most of them came for bread! It was not
the frequency and freedom of our elections, but the
comparatively high wages in America, that the agents
or "runners" of emigrant vessels most heralded and ex-
aggerated, to induce poor laborers .in the old world to
take passage to the new. The population of the world
is said to be some thirteen [fifteen] hundred and fifty
millions. But the population of what is called "the civ-
ilized world," includes less, perhaps, than two hundred
millions, or one to every six or seven of the inhabitants
of the whole earth. These two hundred millions pro-
duce sufficient wealth and have the commerce necessary
to bring the most remote parts of the world into buying
and selling relations with each other. Their telegraphs
and rapid transportation have already made of our earth
a vast whispering gallery; so that the fall of half a cent
is heard "clear round the world." They have made the
power of the cheaper world-wide.
The barbarism and low wages of ten or twelve hun-
dred millions of the human race are therefore in the re-
lation and condition necessary to undersell the civiliza-
tion and higher wages of one or two hundred millions,
as often as their periods of prosperity and "good times"
produce employment and wealth enough to be worth
3 i8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
underselling. From time to time the drag-down power
of this mighty fact, has been allowed to send a financial
and industrial crash, throughout all civilized nations.
It comes with sufficient frequency to keep an expression
of insecurity, anxiety, and alarm stamped upon the faces
of the most enlightened and wealthy classes. It inter-
rupts the pleasures, travel and enterprise of those who
fancy themselves the most secure, strips from them their
purple and fine linen, their silks, laces and broadcloths;
and sells horses, carriages and palaces under the auc-
tioneer's hammer. It consumes the life-long savings of
the most industrious and frugal laborer; robs his chil-
dren of education and culture, takes away his political
power and self-respect, and makes him a tramp and
criminal. If all this is hard for two hundred millions
of Europeans and Americans, the low prices and condi-
tion of more than two thirds of the human race are still
harder. Their physical and mental destitution mean
despotism and idolatry, famine and pestilence ; and the
existence of a capitalist class is the great agency, estab-
lished by purely natural causes, for making the world's
highest civilization sufficiently sensitive to such physical
and moral degradation, through the absolute power of
the cheapest over the dearest. And thus it is that "a sol-
itary sigh hath power to move the whole world!" for
tears and groans will undersell laughter and happiness.
Thus it is that not many silver table knives and forks
can be used on one side of the world, as long as the peo-
ple on the other side are eating with chop sticks! And
when chop sticks are driven out of the world, the present
political economy of the educated classes will follow
them, and never be heard of again. Terrible avalanches
of snow and ice sometimes roll down the Alps, crushing
and carrying with them trees, rocks and villages. But
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 319
these avalanches are the merest boy's snow balls in com-
parison with the world's lowest labor prices and cheap-
ness, which from time to time sweep down from the
misery and barbarism of ten or twelve hundred millions
of forgotten and neglected human beings, and undersell
Christendom.
The statesmanship that is accepted and enthroned in
the United States and England, Germany and France,
advances the most local and contradicting theories to
account for these reverses- theories which will some day
be consigned to the oblivion that has long ago buried
the memories of the superstitious attempt of ignorant
people in past ages to explain the causes of thunder and
lightning, earthquakes and volcanoes, northern lights,
shooting stars and comets, or an eclipse of the sun or
moon. Ever since the world began, "hard times" or
periods of business depression have visited the most
prosperous and powerful nations, as often as their pros-
perity has lifted them sufficiently above the poverty and
misery of surrounding nations to make their superior
condition conspicuous and an object of attraction or of
envy to the people abroad. There is no news that will
travel so far and so rapidly, among the poor, as stories of
abundance; and distance always lends enchantment to
their view. The wealth of the richest countries is al-
ways exaggerated. They are reported as "lands flow-
ing with milk and honey," while, "gold and silver may
be found in their streets." But as often as the hunger
and want of the outside world has undersold, or cap-
tured, or devoured the prosperity of the most successful
nations, the policy that had prevailed, or the statesman-
ship that had reigned when their reverses began, or cul-
minated, has been charged by the sufferers, or the his-
torian, or by various shades of demagogues perhaps,
3 20 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
with being the great criminal cause that ought to have
been dethroned, or voted out of office. And there are
sufficient facts in most cases, to sustain the theory of such
a charge. So that local theories have thus far prevailed
against the view which ought to include the whole
world.
The utmost integrity, industry and unselfishness in
public and private life, and the most ingenious and per-
fect system of finance, currency and taxation, are all
alike failures, if they do nothing but increase the wealth,
wages and prosperity of any single nation, beyond a
certain point or level, above the rest of mankind. The
law of level, or balance, or proportion, is a great fact in
nature, though its moral manifestations are not as easy
to see and comprehend as its physical.
It is easy to see that the balance of a perfect spheroid,
like planet earth, would be destroyed, and its grandest
possibilities be defeated, by having mountains hundreds
of miles high on the one side and valleys hundreds of
miles deep on the other. Physical inequalities like these,
would risk the regularity and certainty of its daily rev-
olutions, and perhaps suddenly move the north and south
poles nearer to the heated equator. This would instant-
ly change its climates and seasons, and before mankind
could recover from the shock, hundreds of millions
would freeze or starve to death. The physical balance
of the earth, and the moral balance of its inhabitants,
are propositions which mutually suggest and argue each
other.
This is very far from saying however, that there can
be no inequalities whatever, upon the face of the earth,
or that the condition or wages of mankind must be pre-
cisely alike all over the world. But the inequalities or
differences must not be sufficient to endanger the balance
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 321
of certain physical or moral necessities. Mountains five
miles high can exist upon our earth. How much higher,
perhaps no one can tell. But there is a limit somewhere.
And it seems equally clear, through the world-wide
law of level in prices, that there is no room upon a planet
no larger than ours, for six cent and five dollar laborers.
The idea that on the same earth, at the same time, there
can be millions of six cent and millions of five dollar
laborers, is as much at war with nature, as that valleys
could be hundreds of miles deep and mountains hun-
dreds of miles high. A whole world of laborers can
have a hundred or a thousand times more for their ser-
vices than any of them now receive. But the idea that
a part of them can be favored by prices a hundred times
larger than the rest, is at war with their solidarity, or
moral balance of nature, and can never prevail.
The famine and starvation prices of Asia, the half civ-
ilization of South America, and the barbarism of Af-
rica and the South Sea Islands are sure to undersell the
wages of Europe and the United States, as soon as they
arise to a certain level ; thus placing natural limits some-
where to the prosperity of the most prosperous, above
which they never can hope to rise until something has
been done to raise the level of the prices that prevail in
the lowest paid countries on the earth.
If this is true, it will establish the fact that the time
has fully arrived, when political economy must begin
with the idea that our country is the world, and our
countrymen are all mankind ! A sufficiently world-wide
view of political economy will explode many of the fal-
lacies, and much of the bitterness that exists. No sur-
prise should ever be felt or expressed when wages are
reduced, or the length of day's works is increased, as
3 22 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
long as more than half of mankind are getting ten cents
a day, or less.
It is a mistake to ask or expect capitalists, who are
nothing but the world's natural agents for this vast
cheapness and misery, to pay more than the lowest wages,
or to accept less than the most hours that prevail for
day's works. The best that can ever be expected of them
is that they will be satisfied with their right to buy in
the cheapest market and sell in the dearest. To do this,
they must employ the cheapest labor they can obtain,
and use machinery as fast as the progress of mankind
makes that more profitable to them than hand labor.
Those who attempt to do much differently are risking
their power to remain capitalists.
More real liberality, sympathy and progress for man-
kind, at large, is contained in the fact that most of them
will pay the lowest wages and prices possible, than in
the few seemingly generous exceptions to this rule.
Sometimes a sympathetic capitalist will attempt to ex-
cuse the reductions made in wages, by saying, on the
"Supply and Demand" theory, "I am not to blame! It
was natural law that did it."
But he says this because he sees only two parties to the
transaction. He sees his own financial danger in case
wages are not reduced; and he also sees the danger of
the laborer's starvation or demoralization, if wages are
reduced.
But the third great element in the case- the fact of the
starved and pauperized labor of Asia and elsewhere,
and the irresistible power of that fact, he does not see
with sufficient clearness to comprehend the largeness of
the situation; though he may have threatened long ago
to send for some of this very labor cheapness to undersell
Europeans and Americans at home. If he could see the
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 323
threefold relation of the situation, and see those abroad
who undersell as clearly as those at home who are under-
sold, his "demand and supply" apology for reducing
wages would perhaps give way to a more Shakespearean
style of excuse; and he could say "not that I love the
laborers of Europe and America less, but the laborers of
the whole world more."
True criticism will never deal with the legitimate or
natural conduct of a capitalist, but with the hundreds of
millions of low paid laborers all over the earth, whose
misery and helplessness make the existence of a capitalist
class possible and necessary. A capitalist cannot be cen-
sured for his own existence therefore. He was born, be-
cause very much worse creations or conditions would
have existed, if his own did not. When wages are re-
duced from time to time, all that .the laborer sees is the
hand of a capitalist. But when he sees the terrific fact
which created capitalists, and which gives them all the
power they ever possess to reduce wages, his anger to-
wards them will soften. He will then see that from hence-
forth the remedies for poverty and low wages must be
world wide! He will no longer be interested in the
claim that "better times" will follow, in this country or
in any other, by local or personal political changes, un-
less they have the most direct reference to the price of
human labor all over the globe. He will see rather that
any political changes proposed are local and narrow,
which do not undertake to deal with more than forty
millions of Americans, or as many more Germans,
Frenchmen and Englishmen. That the remedies pro-
posed in England and Germany, in France and Bel-
gium, in Canada and the United States must agree and
that the politics for labor must be the politics for human
nature. He will see that nothing but the simplest facts
324 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
or politics of human nature can ever succeed with a
world that has a thousand religions and speaks thirty-
six hundred languages; that the conduct of a capitalist
is due to his existence, and that his existence is due to the
existence of hundreds of millions of forgotten laborers ;
and he will see that his wages can be raised by increasing
their compensation and civilization. And that the price
and purchasing power of every worker on the earth can
be increased so easily and naturally, that capitalists will
be absorbed out of existence, or out of the world, by a
process that will produce for every human being in-
finitely more luxuries, security and happiness than can
ever be possessed or enjoyed by people exceptionally
wealthy, but surrounded by millions of poor people,
who are, in the language of John Stuart Mill, "angry,
equally for what they have not, as well as for what
others have."
The world-wide distance that separates the dearest
and cheapest laborers from each other is reduced as fast
as the difference in their wages is increased. The dif-
ference between six cents a day in China, and one or two
dollars a day in America, has already brought these two
countries uncomfortably near to each other; and if the
value of day's works in America could be still further
increased, without increasing their tendency to rise in
China, these two countries would thus be brought still
nearer together than they are today. The unparalleled
stagnation of industry for the last five or six years, and
the consequent fall in our wages, is all that has saved the
eastern and northern part of the United States from a
much larger influx of Chinamen, and the most deadly
competition of the cheapest with the dearest that has
ever occurred since the world began.
And the distress that low paid laborers from abroad
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 325
have already inflicted upon ourselves could not have
been postponed many years longer, even by an immedi-
ate repeal of the special and stolen legislation that has
aided capitalists in their cheap importations. Of course
such legislation ought to be repealed at once, and the ad-
vent of low paid laborers to the United States made to
depend wholly upon their own discovery of the fact that
here is the dearest market for their labor; and their com-
ing to America should be left entirely to unaided private
enterprise.
It is treason to the idea of republicanism, to use the
power of a republic to make labor cheap. Because the
most highly paid labor the world ever saw was necessary
to make a republican government possible. Confidence
in the republic fails when wages fall. All treaties and
intercourse with foreign nations, 'and our local and na-
tional legislation should proceed with reference to the
moral and natural causes that increase the price of hu-
man labor everywhere.
Prices, like water, are always seeking a level. If two
bodies of water are sufficiently near, and sufficiently out
of level with each other, their natural tendency to a
common level causes a disturbance. The falls of Ni-
agara are the disturbance caused by the waters of Lake
Erie seeking the level of Lake Ontario. A water fall
and a wage fall both come from the power of the lowest
level over that of the highest. But while a water fall
means a physical and local level, a wage fall means a
moral and world-wide level; in which it should be as
easy to recognize the relation that Chinese and American
laborers sustain to each other, as the relation that Lake
Ontario sustains to Lake Erie.
The misery and the terrors that Chinamen have al-
ready inflicted upon western America are the moral
326 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
Niagara or judgment that has already begun to fall upon
the world's highest civilization as a retribution and pun-
ishment for forgetting the brotherhood of the entire hu-
man race. But if the love of republican institutions is
not a sufficiently strong or tangible motive to make us
remember the lowest paid laborers on the earth, then the
penalties and punishments for forgetting them should
be remembered.
The world wide power of the lowest, over the highest
paid labor, can no longer be disregarded. The natural
tendency of the capitalist classes to send abroad and im-
port the lowest paid laborers they can obtain is simply
a part of the Divine or natural economy, which makes
the most enlightened selfishness of the human race serve
that part of mankind who have been left behind in the
world's progress. Of course the motives which actuate
an employer to import cheaper labor, are selfish and
narrow. But while he thinks only of himself, he is as
useful and as indispensable in the social economy of the
nineteenth century, as were the monsters, the colossal
mastodons, reptiles, mammoths, and grosser forms of
animal life, that existed ages before this world was in
condition for a human being; and when for immense
periods, it might have seemed as if these were the highest
existences destined to dwell upon the earth.
These huge and terrible beasts were for countless ages
the only capitalists that prevailed ; but their capital con-
sisted in enormous tusks, or jaws like machines for
crushing rocks, and in teeth like paving stones. And
they wandered through tropical woods and shallow lakes
tearing and devouring each other or the trees and giant
weeds, trampling and crushing everything in their way.
They were the great living millstones of nature, for
grinding and digesting by the massiveness and power of
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 327
their physical strength and capital, the wildest and
crudest conditions in vegetable and animal life. In the
grand economy of nature, they prepared the earth for
man. But their brutish and hungry natures were no
more oblivious to the humanity and immortality that
were to come after them, than capitalistic selfishness and
ignorance are oblivious today to the Divinity and heaven
upon earth that are to follow when they have sufficiently
prepared the way.
The great instrumentalities created by nature, are
never allowed to see or know too much or too little.
How much milk would a cow give, if she knew or saw
ever so much more than was necessary to fulfil the func-
tion of a cow? She would be unhappy, and finally die
with the idea of eating grass or hay all day in the fields
and barns just to make butter and cheese and improve
the taste of tea and coffee. But if cows saw or knew too
little they could not give milk. They see and know just
enough to fulfil the function of a cow.
The lamb thy rite dooms to bleed today,
Had he thy reason, would he skip and play?
Pleased to the last, he crops the flowery food ;
And licks the hand just raised to shed his blood.
When a Massachusetts capitalist proclaimed his in-
tention of sending to the other side of the world for men
who would work cheaper than American "Crispins,"
it was a proclamation, or a voice from heaven, by the way
of hell, that "God hath made of one blood all nations
that dwell upon all the face of the earth." If we forget
the Fatherhood of God, and the brotherhood of man,
our day's works will be undersold by those who have
been forgotten. The fact that a pagan will work cheap-
er than a Christian, should enlarge the original idea of
foreign missions. The highest wages paid on the earth
32 g AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
are paid to Christians. Has a heathen been truly con-
verted to Christianity who works for six cents a day?
The lowest wages and the highest civilization cannot go
together, and Christianity ought to mean infinitely more
than any civilization that has ever prevailed since the
world began. The teachings of geology afford a hint of
the fact that ever since planet earth began its course
around the sun, the vast physical changes that have
slowly succeeded each other, have always included the
whole world.
And it seems equally necessary and according to na-
ture, that the whole world should be included, in the
grander moral changes of its future. And that the moral
power necessary to reach every human being on the
earth, shall be equal to the physical power exercised in
creating a whole world for man.
In its beginning, the earth was a vast body of liquid
luminous fire; intensely heated, and exceedingly rare.
And in this condition, nebulous, gaseous, vapory, molten,
it could spin itself into a mighty spheroid. But for
countless ages there could be no changing seasons, no
nights, no water, no life, nothing but fire, fire, every-
where, through and through the world. As its heat
gradually decreased, a crust began to form; and then
for long ages the globe swung round the sun, the heated,
steaming, hissing, boiling arena of a relentless conflict
between thousands of millions of cubic miles of liquid
fire within its cooling crust, and oceans of water bursting
in from without, until in the lapse of ages the entire sur-
face of the earth -rock and mountain ribbed -was final-
ly land and water made.
Then followed ages of vegetation, in which the world
was plant made. Then followed other ages in which it
was beast made, and finally it was man made. Next,
nine] THE HOURS OF LABOR 329
the whole world is to be heaven, or angel made. But
before the comparative perfection to come can exist
upon any part of our earth, the last savage, or pagan, or
ten cent laborer, must have disappeared as completely
as the fire and steam, and grosser forms of animal life,
that prepared the way for man. Natural causes can
make every laborer on the earth so costly that the most
productive and expensive machinery necessary to pro-
duce wealth abundantly and rapidly and easily will be
made cheaper than human exertions.
The power of the cheapest will then drive out of the
markets, and out of the world the higher cost poverty of
hand labor with the wealth of machinery. The only ob-
ject in the universe to be made dear, is Man! His ex-
pensiveness, makes every thing else cheap, provided it
is so universal that no human being- can be found on the
earth to undersell another. And when the statesmanship
that presides over the civilized world, has learned the
natural way to increase the price of human labor any
where, it has learned how it can be done everywhere.
And a whole world of men sufficiently dear can make
a world of wealth cheaper than a world of poverty.
5. THE FIRST STATE LAW
Public Laws of Illinois, 1867, p. xox. The following was the first
state law enacted. Similar laws were adopted in the same year by
Missouri (March 13), and New York (May 9). Each of these
laws permitted a longer day by contract.
AN ACT making eight hours a legal day's work. Ap-
proved and in force March 5, 1867. i. Be it enacted
by the People of the State of Illinois, represented in the
General Assembly, on and after the first day of May,
1867, eight hours of labor between the rising and the
setting of the sun, in all mechanical trades, arts, and em-
ployments, and other cases of labor and service by the
day, except in farm employments, shall constitute and
be a legal day's work, where there is no special contract
or agreement to the contrary.
2. This act shall not apply to or in any way affect
labor or service by the year, month, or week; nor shall
any person be prevented by anything herein contained
from working as many hours over time, or extra hours
as he or she may agree, and shall not, in any sense, be
held to apply to farm labor.
INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS
i. THE NATIONAL LABOR UNION AND
THE INTERNATIONAL WORKING-
MEN'S ASSOCIATION
(a) THE NATIONAL LABOR CONGRESS PROCEEDINGS
National Labor Congress, 1866. Workingman's Advocate, Sept. i, 1866,
p. 4, col. 2.
[By Mr. Harding of New York] WHEREAS, a
World's Congress of Labor is about to be held in the
City of Geneva, one of the cantons of the Swiss Repub-
lic; and whereas the time is now too short for a delegate
to be sent from these United States, therefore
RESOLVED, that the Executive Council of the National
Labor Union be authorized to tender the thanks of this
convention to the Central Organization of Labor in
Europe, together with a copy of the proceedings of this
convention, bidding them God speed in their glorious
work: and that the executive council, in the event of an-
other such convention being held before another meet-
ing of this Congress, they be authorized to send a dele-
gate to such convention. [Adopted.]
National Labor Congress, 1867. Workingman's Advocate, August 24
(31), 1867, p. 2, col. 4, and p. 3, col. 2.
[By committee on delegate to Europe] RESOLVED,
that this Labor union, during its present session, elect
a delegate to proceed without unnecessary delay to Eu-
rope for the purpose of examination into their systems
of combination and co-operation, and that he have
power to enter into such arrangements by treaty or other-
wise, as he may deem best for the prevention of special
334 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
importations to impoverish alike the workingmen of
America and Europe, and to effect a more perfect un-
derstanding as to the workings of the various reform
associations in both countries.
Mr. Cameron called attention to the fact that it would
be of little use for a delegate to go to Europe this year,
to the Lausanne Congress, but it would be desirable
that the delegate be present at the meeting of 1868.
Mr. Sylvis moved the appointment of a committee to
send an agent to Europe, who could do great service in
letting men know when we have strikes in this country,
and gain information from the people which he can
transmit to the workingmen in this country. Mr. Sylvis
further stated that he did not think a man would gather
half as much knowledge from attending the congress as
by looking around among the workmen. He had not
been able in the past to succeed in letting the people
there know of the existence of strikes in this country, as
the secretary of the union in England had been in league
with the emigration agent, and shared the head money
with him.
Mr. Trevellick mentioned several cases of men who
had been induced to emigrate here on promise of work,
and had then been offered work on farms at twelve dol-
lars per month.
Mr. Michels, of Pittsburgh, said that the employers
in that section had organized to bring on an overwhelm-
ing flux of glass blowers from Europe, and the working-
men of that city alone would do a great deal towards
paying the expense of an agent to Europe to counteract
the evil workings of the bosses.
Mr. Hinchcliffe referred to the operations of the
Emigrant Aid Society, which was ostensibly formed
for the purpose of settling up the public lands, but these
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 335
gentlemen were themselves locating college scrip, and
doing all they could to prevent these lands from being
settled. The fact is, they are a perfect pack of swindlers,
operating on the workingmen of Europe by their agents
there, and bringing them over here to the detriment of
their own interests. The sooner that system of swindling
was abolished, the better. The men who have been at
the head of the trades organization in Europe have too
often accepted bribes from employers here to send men
over to the states like a pack of cattle, while it is well
known that there are hundreds of thousands here out of
employment. They deceive the men there, ill treat them
on the passage, and cheat them when they arrive here.
An agent should be sent over to Europe at once to coun-
teract that plan of working.
Mr. Lucker said it was a very good thing, if they
could only "bell the cat." He did not know where the
finances were to come from.
Mr. Scott, of Pittsburgh, said that the men brought
over to that city from Prussia were not brought here by
the Emigrant Aid Societies, but by an assessment on
each furnace, and sent over to the American consul there
who, for $40,000, agreed to send i ,000 men over here and
did send about 800. The workmen agreed among them-
selves, that at no trade would they work side by side
with those imported men, who were now being support-
ed by the employers to save a greater trouble.
Mr. Harding thought it would pay to send three del-
egates to Europe instead of one. He would move this
in amendment, to test the sense of the house.
Mr. Peabody thought that one agent was plenty; he
should reside there for a length of time, and put the
heads of unions in communication with each other. . .
[AFTERNOON SESSION.] The Union proceeded to
33 6 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
consider action on the question of sending a delegate to
Europe. The question was taken on Mr. Harding's
amendment to the amendment of striking out one and
inserting three and was declared lost. The question was
also taken on Mr. Cameron's amendment, and it was
declared lost. The original report was then adopted.
[By Mr. Hinchcliffe] RESOLVED, that this congress
deprecates the practice, too often adopted, by the Amer-
ican consuls in Europe, of lending their aid to the capi-
talists of these states, by acting as agents for the purpose
of sending invoices of workmen to the order of men who
use them to supplant the industrial orders of our own
country. [Adopted.]
[By Mr. Evans (p. 3, col. 2) ] WHEREAS, the efforts of
the working classes of Europe to obtain political power,
improve their status social and otherwise, and to throw
off the servitude in which they have been, and are now
placed by the institutions and laws under which they
live, afford a gratifying indication of the progress of
justice, enlightment, and of the sentiments of humanity,
therefore be it
RESOLVED, that the National Labor Congress express
its sympathy for co-operation with them in their strug-
gle against political and social wrongs.
RESOLVED, that our delegate to Europe be requested
to convey to the working classes whom he may meet
with, in the performance of his mission, our sympathy
and purpose of co-operation.
[Adopted.]
National Labor Congress, 1868.
From Report of William J. Jessup, Vice-president, and Corresponding
Representative of New York State, to the President of the National
Labor Union. Proceedings, p. 10.
. . . Of those received eight [letters] were from
Great Britain, four were written by the secretary of the
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 337
International Workingmen's Association. On July 20,
I received one from J. George Eccarius, general secre-
tary of the association, containing an invitation on the
part of the general council, embodied in the following
resolution:
RESOLVED, that the American National Labor Union be invited
to send a delegation to the International Labor Congress, to be held
on the first Monday of September next, at Brussels, in Belgium. That
in the absence of the secretary for America, the general secretary be
instructed to forward the foregoing resolution to Mr. Wm. J. Jessup,
the corresponding officer of the National Labor Union for New York.
On receipt of the above I communicated the resolu-
tion to you, and requested you to answer to the associa-
tion. I also wrote the association by the next mail in-
forming them that, in the absence of any appropriation
to cover the expense of sending delegates, we should
have to decline the invitation, with thanks for the cour-
tesy extended the National Labor Union. . .
National Labor Congress, 1869.
Workingman's Advocate, Sept. 4, 1869, p. 4, col. 3.
An invitation was received from J. George Eccarius,
general secretary of Central Council of London of the
International Workingmen's Association to send a dele-
gate to the International Congress of that association to
be opened at Basle, Switzerland, on the sixth of next
month. 26
Mr. Horace Day, of New York, moved to refer to
the president and executive committee. Agreed to.
[SIXTH DAY.] C. H. Lucker moved to appoint a
delegate to represent the union at the International Con-
gress, which is to meet in Switzerland, in September.
Agreed to. On motion of Mr. J. C. Sylvis, Mr. A. C.
Cameron was unanimously elected as such delegate. On
- 5 Extract from this letter is in Ely's Labor Movement, 227.
33 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
motion of H. H. Day, of New York, Mr. C. H. Lucker
was elected associate delegate. . .
National Labor Congress, 1870.
From Report of R. F. Trevellick, president. Workingman's Advocate,
Aug. 27, 1870, p. i, col. 4; p. 4, col. i; p. 2, col. 8; p. 3, col. i; p. 3,
col. 2.
At the session of the last Labor Congress a resolution
was passed to send a representative from the National
Labor Union of the United States to the International
Workingmen's Congress at Basle, Switzerland. Mr.
A. C. Cameron was elected and accredited as our repre-
sentative, and from official letters received from there,
was gladly received and highly complimented for the
high-minded and noble stand he took while there in the
cause he so faithfully represented, and it shows the wis-
dom and forethought evinced by the congress in the
selection of a representative on so important a mission.
The following are the resolutions passed by the Gen-
eral Council of the International Workingmen's Asso-
ciation : i st. That an emigration bureau be established
in conjunction with the National Labor Union of the
United States. 2nd. That in case of strikes the Council
shall by all possible means endeavor to prevent workmen
being engaged in Europe to be used by American capi-
talists against the workman of America.
I have not taken any action on the communication and
resolutions, for I am under the impression there is no
power vested in the president by the constitution, or by
the last congress, to indorse so important a project offi-
cially, without positive instructions from the congress.
I therefore call your attention to the matter, and recom-
mend that this congress take some action in regard to it,
that the efforts put forth by our able and efficient repre-
sentative in a foreign land may not be in vain, but rather
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 339
to bring the workingmen of Europe and the United
States into a closer bond of unity.
[SECOND DAY] Mr. A. C. Cameron, of Chicago, the
delegate to the International Congress held at Basle,
Switzerland, in 1869, presented his report. The report
was accepted and placed on file.
[SIXTH DAY-By Mr. Cameron, of Illinois] RESOLVED,
that this congress appoint a permanent committee of
five, who shall constitute for the ensuing year the Inter-
national Bureau of Labor and Emigration, in accord-
ance with the recommendation of the International
Workingmen's Congress, held at Basle, Switzerland,
submitted by the delegate from the American National
Labor Union.
RESOLVED, that the duties of this Bureau shall be gen-
erally to enter into correspondence with trades, labor
and emigration associations in Europe; obtain and for-
ward information as to the condition of trade and labor,
rates of wages, strikes and other such intelligence as may
be valuable in the work of ameliorating the condition of
labor here and in the old world; to publish the same as
may be desirable, and otherwise aid the one high pur-
pose of all who work for our reform -that of the com-
plete unity and enfranchisement of labor everywhere.
[Adopted.]
[SEVENTH DAY-By Mr. Sorge] Resolved, the Na-
tional Labor Union, assembled in Congress, declares
its adhesion to the principles of the International Work-
ing-men's Association, and expects at no distant day to
affiliate with it. . . [Adopted.]
Committee on International Labor, Immigration and
Statistical Bureau [announced from the chair] -A. C.
Cameron, of Illinois; F. A. Sorge, of New York; Chas.
340 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
McLean, of Massachusetts; H. J. Walls, of Ohio; and
M. Mehahn, of Maryland.
National Labor Union, 1871.
Workingman's Advocate, Aug. 19, 1871, p. i, col. 7.
[By Mr. Day] RESOLVED, that this congress represent-
ing to a large extent the great laboring interests of the
United States, thanks the International Workingman's
Association of Europe, and their associates in the United
States for the kindly sentiments expressed in their ad-
dress to this body. Resolved, that a committee of the
National Labor Union be appointed by the president of
this organization within the next thirty days, to answer
said address, and to procure authentic information re-
specting the great events specially referred to, and such
other information as may seem necessary in our efforts
to promote the true interests of labor, civilization and
progress throughout the civilized world. [Adopted.]
(b) SYLVIS AND THE INTERNATIONAL
Report of the Fourth Annual Congress of the International Working-
men's Association, 1869. English version, pamphlet, p. 13. Follow-
ing is the concluding paragraph of the annual report of the General
Council.
. . . During last May, a war between the United
States and England seemed eminent. Your General
Council, therefore, sent an address to Mr. Sylvis, the
president of the American National Labour Union, call-
ing on the United States' working class to command
peace where their would-be masters shouted war. The
sudden death of Mr. Sylvis, that valiant champion of
our cause, will justify us in concluding this report, as
an homage to his memory, by his reply to our letter:
Your favour of the twelfth instant, with address enclosed, reached
me yesterday. I am very happy to receive such kindly words from our
fellow-working men across the water: our cause is a common one. It
is war between poverty and wealth: labour occupies the same low
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 341
condition, and capital is the same tyrant in all parts of the world.
Therefore I say our cause is a common one. I, in behalf of the work-
ing people of the United States, extend to you, and through you to
those you represent, and to all the down-trodden and oppressed sons
and daughters of toil in Europe, the right hand of fellowship. Go
a-head in the good work you have undertaken, until the most glorious
success crowns your efforts. That is our determination. Our late
war resulted in the building up of the most infamous monicd aris-
tocracy on the face of the earth. This monied power is fast eating
up the substance of the people. We have made war upon it, and we
mean to win. If we can, we will win through the ballot-box: if not,
then we will resort to sterner means. A little blood-letting is some-
times necessary in desperate cases.
By order of the Council, R. APPLEGARTH, chairman
COWELL STEPNEY, treasurer
J. GEORGE ECCARIUS, general secretary.
(c) THE DELEGATE TO BASLE
From editorial letters in Working man's Advocate t Nov.-Dec., 1869, by
A. C. Cameron, delegate to the congress of the International Work-
ingmen's Association at Basle, 1869. Cameron, as a member of the
National Labor Union, was a leading advocate of greenbackism and
political action.
[November 6] ... While the discussions and
the subjects discussed in the Philadelphia congress as-
sumed a widely different range from those entertained
at the Basle Convention, the objects aimed at and the
intention of the delegates of both bodies were identical,
viz : the establishment of a true democracy-surrounding
circumstances, customs, and the texture of society amply
accounting for any apparent discrepancy. If the delib-
erations of the one body were, in some respects of a more
advanced or radical hue than those embodied in the oth-
er, the grievances complained of are also of a different
and more aggravated character. The wrongs which
exist in one hemisphere, and of which the toiling masses
so justly complain, were brought into being under far
342
AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
[Vol.
different auspices from those which exist in the other;
hence it is necessary to understand the nature of these
circumstances before criticism on the action of either is
worthy of more than a passing notice. One important
fact, however, must not be forgotten -that while the in-
stitutions, and state of society prevailing in Europe are
a legitimate offspring -the inevitable offshoot of despot-
ism -in the other it is a perversion -a maladministration
of the spirit of our institutions which has created the evils
of which the American workman complains. In the
one case a thorough re-construction is imperatively de-
manded ; in the other a just administration of the funda-
mental principles upon which the government is found-
ed alone is required.
Again, the American Congress demands the adoption
of a just monetary system ; the European convention that
right to private property in land shall be abolished.
Here certainly there is no conflict. In the Old World,
a landed aristocracy monopolizes the soil -the heritage
of the people -and the results are seen in the moral and
social degradation of the agricultural laborers both in
France and England -where the wages system is exhib-
ited in its most deplorable light. In the New World r
by destroying the overshadowing, unhallowed, blight-
ing influence of the monied power, we destroy its ability
to create the vassalage of which the teeming millions of
Europe complain, so that by destroying the lesser evil,
the greater evil is averted ; though there is no doubt that,
however revolutionary the demand referred to may ap-
pear to the American mind, in principle it is substantial-
ly correct. . . So with the question of Inheritance, a
subject which also engrossed the attention of the Basle
Convention. The law of entail and primogeniture -a
relic of barbarism -which still exists in the countries of
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 343
the Old World, but from which we are happily exempt
on this side of the Atlantic, taken in connection with the
action had upon the land question, gives a force and
plausibility to the resolutions of the convention, which
would be somewhat out of place in an American assem-
bly.
On the important topic of trades unions which, in our
judgment, present the only feasible means by which the
education, systematic organization and concerted politi-
cal action of the masses may be secured -the English
delegates were far in advance of their continental breth-
ren. The plain, matter of fact statements of Messrs.
Applegarth and Lessner, in relation to what had been
accomplished through their agency in Great Britain,
possessed a value far in advance of the theoretical
schemes of many of the French and Italian delegates,
and spoke volumes in favor of the prudence and sterling
common sense of those who had controlled their ac-
tion. . .
[November 27] . . . We now propose to refer
briefly to the motives which guided us in declining to
take any part in the discussion. While we fully recog-
nized the force of the arguments, as presented from their
stand-point, we, also realized that the same arguments
could not and did not apply to the state of affairs existing
in our own country; in fact, that individual enterprise
and reward had been the great lever- the incentive,
which had produced the results which had astonished
and almost revolutionized the world ; that the recogni :
tion of this principle was the corner stone -the founda-
tion of our republican institutions. To illustrate: in
Europe, the masses are denied the fruits of their labors.
No matter how frugal or industrious they may be, a life
of unrequited toil is their only reward. The "divine
344 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
right," with its attendant evils, are recognized in their
theory of government, while their pernicious influences
have impregnated all classes of society. In our own
country no such state of society need exist. Our govern-
ment is based upon a principle which recognizes the
right of the individual, the rights of the whole people -
as opposed to the claims of a pampered or privileged
few. To the emigrant who seeks our shores, we say:
"Welcome to a land, where, by thrift and honest toil,
you can reap the rewards of your labor, and secure an
independence for yourself and little ones." It is, we
repeat, this inducement to individual exertion which
has developed our resources and made our land an asy-
lum for the oppressed throughout the world. To change
it to the plan advocated would be to revolutionize the
fundamental principles upon which our government was
organized, and extinguish the last hope -entertained
by the oppressed in the Old Wo rid -that some day they
may find a welcome home in the land beyond the
sea. . .
Again, the political privileges possessed by the Amer-
ican citizen places a correction of any threatened or
existing evil within his reach. In France, the guillo-
tine and barricade -with their attendant horrors -fur-
nish too frequently the only means by which the pent-up
fury of an outraged people can find expression. Here
they are superseded by the ballot and the intelligence
of the people. . .
But while we so write -and while we believe that our
constituents endorse both our conduct and our senti-
ments, we do not desire to take exception to the action
of the "international." On the contrary, we believe,
were the working classes of America cursed by the same
system and situation as their European brethren are,
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 345
their sentiments would be the same. As it is, we bid
them "God speed" in their noble resolve, while we
declare, with a determination that knows no denial, that
not another acre of our public domain, shall be given
to or stolen by any public or private corporation.
[December 11] . . . The next day is Saturday,
the last of the session, and the questions of all questions
in which the English delegates are interested, viz: pop-
ular education and trades' unions, are now before the
convention. The report of the committee on the latter
subject is crude and unsatisfactory. It is evident that
no trades' unionist has had a hand in its framing. Few,
if any of the arguments have the ring of the true metal ;
the testimony of experience is lacking. There is too
much speculative theory, and too little common sense.
Many of the speakers seem to doubt their necessity or
efficiency, till their attention is riveted by the startling
revelations of Caporusso, who with stentorian tones, and
flashing eye, gives them the frightful statistics of his
city- which he classifies as follows: Of a population
of 600,000, there are 150,000 lazzaroni; speculators,
100,000; retailers and usurers, 150,000; and but 200,000
honest toilers to provide food, clothing and shelter for
all, who have to work fifteen hours per day ; and as many
live on the outskirts of the city, they are engaged some
eighteen or nineteen hours out of the twenty-four, to be
able to prolong their miserable existence. In the gov-
ernment factories they are supervised by gendarmes, and
treated like criminals. They have given up all hopes
of a redress at the hands of the middle class. The erec-
tion of a republic would not aid them. It would only
substitute one species of despotism for another. What
they want is systematic organization, and that want
trades' unions can alone supply them.
346 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
The impression made is evidently a favorable one for
the trades' unionists; Hins of Brussels, and Flaheaut of
Paris, endorse the views of the former speaker. There
is no time to lose; the formation and combination of
trades' unions is of the utmost importance. So long
as no combination exists, nothing can be done ; combined
the working class can act socially and politically; with-
out organization they must remain where they are, and
trades' unions therefore are indispensable. Fruneau,
Tolain and Durant of Paris, follow in opposition. They
can not agree with Hins, that the future social state of
mankind will be simply an aggregate of trades' unions ;
that humanity will only appear in the character of butch-
ers, bakers, etc. There are other interests -human in-
terests, which bind together and determine their social
and political relations. . . But few if any practical
views are uttered, until Applegarth of London, in a
series of sound, common sense resolutions, presents the
subject in its true light, referring to the causes which
made them a necessity, the identity of the interests of
labor, that such interests can only be secured by com-
bination and interchange of sentiments, calling upon
the various sections to take immediate steps for the form-
ation of co-operative associations. These resolutions,
he tells them, are based on a life of active experience
amongst the English trades' unions, and not only treat
the question from the point at which the unions started,
but show how they can be extended internationally, and
how they will be developed from the first form to a
higher and better organization; and how their influence
can be used for the extension of education. But not-
withstanding this appeal, impatience is manifested, and
the recommendation of the committee is carried by a
show of hands.
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 347
By mutual consent the business of the convention now
terminates, and the president calls on the American del-
egate to address the convention. After its delivery in
English, its translation into French and German fol-
lows. It is well received by all present, especially the
statement that the members of the National Labor Union
have cut themselves aloof from both the political parties
which have heretofore occupied such a prominent posi-
tion. The mission and the sentiments are greeted in the
spirit in which they were conceived -and the enthu-
siastic applause which follows their delivery tells its own
tale.
Gracefully the president responds ; and in the name of
the toilers of Europe sends a greeting to their brethren
across the sea; the loss of Mr. Sylvis is referred to in
terms which show that his worth 'has been appreciated
as much on this as on the other side of the Atlantic; the
suggestion for the establishment of a Labor Bureau is
endorsed, and the appointment of a delegate to Cincin-
nati assured. . .
[December 18] . . . Perhaps, where all have
done so well, and when the object of our mission is con-
sidered, it may be deemed invidious to refer to any class
or nationality, in other than terms of the highest praise;
nor yet is it our intention to do so ; candor, however, com-
pels the admission that England has furnished the ablest
and most practical body of men in the Congress, al-
though Eccarius and Lessner are Germans, and Jung a
Swiss. The German delegates, prominent among whom
have been Liebknecht of Vienna, Rittinghausen of Sol-
ingen, and Hess of Berlin, besides a score of others, from
various sections of the continent, seemed to our entire
satisfaction, to steer clear of the more ultra views, and
allowed their reason, rather than their passion, to con-
34 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
trol their judgment; and we may as well say so as think
so, that it is just in such a class of men that we "take
stock;" our sympathies have invariably been with them.
We trust, however, our readers will not suppose from
these remarks, that we admire the less the lion-hearted
heroism of those men who, of a more impulsive nature,
and raised under different circumstances, have occu-
pied a somewhat ultra position. By no means. We
honor and appreciate them all. Desperate cases require
desperate remedies, and we are well aware, that when
the bayonet is the only argument, and the aspiration for
liberty is followed by incarceration in a felon's cell, that
argument, or an appeal to justice, seems entirely out of
place. But fortunately, in our own country, we have
not yet reached that depth, and God grant we never
may- and this probably accounts for our partiality.
[December 25] As many of our readers know, steps
have recently been taken by the International Working-
men's Association, at the earnest request of the Ameri-
can delegate to the late European Congress, to establish
an Emigration Bureau, through which a supervision
shall be jointly exercised by the American and Euro-
pean associations, over the emigration, which is con-
stantly flowing to our country. . .
Ever since the completion of the Atlantic telegraph,
it has been the threat of unprincipled employers, in
every state where an unpleasantness has occurred, to
threaten the importation of foreign workmen; to use
their expression, "Well, there is one thing we can do;
if our men do not see fit to accept our terms, we can
telegraph for those who will ;" and in many instances
they have been enabled to put their threats into execu-
tion. . .
It is needless to state that it is not contemplated in the
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 349
most remote degree to interfere with what is known as
legitimate emigration. No rational being objects or can
object, to the workman of the old world leaving its over-
crowded marts, and seeking to better his condition in
our own land. In fact, experience has proven that the
truest friend the emigrant finds in his new home is his
fellow-craftsman; but there is as much difference be-
tween the advent of an emigrant who comes to strength-
en our hands, and the importation of a class of men who
are brought to thwart the legitimate claims of our me-
chanics, to pauperize labor and flood the market, as
there is between an angel of darkness and an angel of
light. . . During the past summer the public were
lashed into a furore over what they were pleased to term -
the exorbitant demands of the miners in the anthracite
regions of Pennsylvania, while the facts of the case were,
that few if any of them were receiving two dollars and
fifty cents per day. The report of the "Committee on
Mining" disclosed this important fact, at the National
Labor Congress. The report was extensively copied,
and the odium which had heretofore unjustly rested on
the miners, in a great measure removed. Thereby the
blame was placed where it rightfully belonged -on the
conscienceless knaves who alone are responsible for the
uncalled for rise of prices. But no sooner was their lit-
tle game blocked, and the truth made known; no sooner
was it discovered that they could no longer ply their
vocation with impunity, than a movement was set on
foot to secure, by misrepresentation, the services of
Scotch and English miners. Consequently the most out-
rageous falsehoods were circulated and the most exag-
gerated inducements held out to those ignorant of the
true state of affairs. On landing in Liverpool, we
found the dock placarded with advertisements for min-
350
AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY
ers, in the very regions where from twelve thousand to
fifteen thousand men were out of employment, contend-
ing for an honest day's wages for an honest day's work,
which contained the most false and shameless state-
ments-yet, statements which, no doubt, succeeded in
duping many an honest, unsuspecting miner, who would
sooner have cut off his right arm than defraud his broth-
er of his dues. Now, under the system proposed, no
such wrong can be perpetrated, no such deception suc-
ceed. Where a legitimate demand exists, the truth will
be made known ; when the "crushing" process is attempt-
ed, the fact can be as easily understood on the other as
on this side of the Atlantic.
Under proper management, branches of the emigra-
tion bureau can be established in every city in Europe
where the authority or influence of the "International"
is recognized, and our own people placed in direct com-
munication with its officials. We shall look with much
interest to the action of the Cincinnati Congress, believ-
ing that it will give its cordial sanction to the movement,
and perfect a plan by which it can be carried into prac-
tical operation.
2. THE INTERNATIONAL IN AMERICA
[The General Council, or executive committee, of the
International Workingmen's Association, of which Karl
Marx was the leading character and J. George Eccarius
the corresponding secretary for America, was located at
London. Monthly reports were made to this General
Council by the several branches in different countries,
each of which was known as a National Federation.
The North American Federation was organized at New
York in 1871, and its first report was forwarded in April
of that year. Following are extracts from the copy-
book in manuscript, giving so much of these monthly
reports as relate to the efforts to internationalize the
American movement. The writer is F. A. Sorge, cor-
responding secretary, a German music-master who had
lived in America since 1852. Sorge was a delegate to
the congresses of the National Labor Union in 1868,
1869, and 1870, and secured the adoption of his resolu-
tions for affiliation with the International. He repre-
sented Labor Union, No. 5, of New York, composed of
German working men. This union was an outgrowth
of a Lassallean organization, which in 1868 became the
Social Party of New York. After the Congress of the
National Labor Union in 1870, it withdrew from that
body and became in 1871, Section No. i of the North
American Federation of the International. As soon as
it was organized the federation addressed the circular
of May 21, 1871, to the trades' unions of America, invit-
ing their affiliation.
[From December, 1871, until after the Congress at
352 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
The Hague in September, 1872, the central committee
was occupied with internal dissensions. These grew out
of the admission of Section 12, dominated by Victoria
Woodhull and Tennessee Claflin, publishers of Wood-
hull and Claflins Weekly, who were charged with intro-
ducing issues foreign to the labor question, such as wo-
man's suffrage, free love, universal language, etc. A
split occurred, and both factions appealed to the Con-
gress at The Hague for recognition. Sorge's faction
adopted a resolution that no section would be admitted
which did not consist of at least three-fourths wage-la-
borers. His faction was recognized at The Hague, and
was made, in fact, the new General Council for the pur-
pose of transferring the headquarters of the Internation-
al from London to New York.
[After the Congress of The Hague, Sorge became the
corresponding secretary of the General Council of the
International, and Bolte the secretary of the American
committee. The latter made the appeal of January 29,
1873, to the Workingmen's Assembly of the State of
New York. At the same time the General Council made
its last attempt to organize on an international basis, this
time confined to each separate trade. This change in
policy had been adopted at The Hague and the plan was
approved at the Congress at Geneva, 1873. It is given
below in the form adopted by the carpenters of Liege,
Belgium, and the German carpenters of New York.
[Failing in these attempts the effort was made to na-
tionalize the International in the form of the United
Workers of America, 1874, an d afterward in the Inter-
national Labor Union of America, 1878. The latter
organization included Ira Steward and the Eight-Hour
leaders.]
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 353
(a) CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE NORTH AMERI-
CAN FEDERATION OF THE INTERNATIONAL
WORKWOMEN'S ASSOCIATION
Copy Book of above committee, April 2, 1871, pp. 1-4. Original manu-
script preserved at the University of Wisconsin.
To THE GENERAL COUNCIL. Report of the N.A. Cen-
tral Committee of the I.W.A. The Sections represented
in this C.C. have been enumerated as follows:
General German Workingmen's Society (Labor Union No 5) Section No. I.
French Section of the I. W. A. at New York
Czechian [i.e., Bohemian] Workingmen's Society
German Social political Workingmen's Society No. i at Chicago
" Democratic " " " at New York
Irish Section of the I. W. A. " " "
German Social Democratic Society at Williamsburgh (N.Y.)
Section No. i is active in the N.Y. Arbeiter Union,
the central delegation of the N.Y. German Trades
Unions, and pushing the foundation of a new Working-
men's Weekly in the German language.
Section 2 have adopted a new constitution and plan
of working and have nominated a Committee on Emi-
gration.
Section 3 is gaining influence on their countrymen and
the papers appearing in their language, discussed Co-
operation pretty lively.
Sections 4 and 5 are discussing the present situation,
counteracting the influence and emanations of the Ger-
man Chauvinistic press in Chicago.
Section 6 is doing good work especially among the
German cabinet makers and carvers in the city of N.Y.
Section 7 is increasing rapidly and trying (effectual-
ly) to gain influence in the new combination of Irish
Revolutionary Societies in the United States (Irish Con-
federation).
Section 8 is actively engaged in propagating our prin-
354 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
ciples amongst the numerous workingmen of a thickly
populated suburb of the city of N.Y. Section I has fifty
members in good standing, II, fifty-five, III, twenty-
eight, IV and V, seventy, VI, fifty, VII, twenty-six, VIII not
given.
The affiliation of a new Section (8) in Williams-
burgh, a suburb of this city, has been mentioned in the
above report. According to the last news a reorganiza-
tion of the German Section in San Francisco is taking
place.
Sections I and VI are holding joint meetings once every
month, discussing questions of principle opened by a
lecture of one of their respective members. The third
lecture was given by R. Starke (of I) on the time and
hours of labor, the fourth by Edw. Grosse (of VI ) on
Organization and Agitation.
A circular letter to all the Workingmen's Societies,
Trades Unions, etc., of this country will be adopted and
soon be published.
The momentous [struggle?] between the Miners and
Workingmen's Benevolent Association of Pennsylvania
and the combined capitalists, owners of railroads, canals,
mines, etc. is occupying the earnest attention of the C.C.
who have tried with some success to influence the action
of the N.Y. Workingmen's Union and Arbeiter Union
with regard to it. An address of sympathy has been sent
to the M. and W.B.A. and to the released Austrian
Workingmen prisoners.
The establishment of a German Workingmen j Week-
ly has made some progress, but its appearance may not
be expected before some months. The "Arbeiter Union"
is taking steps towards holding a great workingmen's
festival, probably for the benefit of the before mentioned
Weekly, and for the furthering of this purpose has en-
tered into communications with this C.C.
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 355
A very lively debate is going on in the Workingmen's
Union about Cooperation and Cooperative Societies.
The Constitution of the W.U. containing the phrase,
"that the interests of capital and labor are identical," it
was lately boldly charged and proved, that this is a fal-
lacy and a special committee reported unanimously
that the W.U. should be composed of delegates repre-
senting labor, not capital.
The National Labor Union is losing ground amongst
the great National and International Trades Unions of
this country: the Workingmen's Assembly of New York
(Presdt: Wm. J. Jessup), the Cigarmakers' Internation-
al Union, the Bricklayers' National Union etc. all refus-
ing at their last conventions to appoint delegates to the
next Labor Congress in St. Louis.
The Workingmen's Assembly 'of the State of New
York was lately held in Albany. Its principal work was
the devising of measures to gain influence on the legisla-
tion of this state. An Apprentice Law and laws against
the use of old barrels, for a thorough examination of
steamboiler engineers, against contract work in the
prisons, for the establishment of a Statistical Labor Bu-
reau, against the working of children in factories, for
the better protection of life and limbs, etc., were sub-
mitted. It was resolved: "That a cooperative enter-
prise be defined as one in which the stockholder has but
one vote each and the profits are divided between capital
and labor engaged in the enterprise." (10) Ten cents
annually per member were levied for the expenses of the
W.A. The president's office was made salaried with
eight hundred dollars per annum and Wm. J. Jessup
reflected president. A resolution was also passed ap-
proving and endorsing the principles of the I.W.A. con-
cluding: "Workingmen of all countries, unite!" Courts
35 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
The emancipation of the working classes must be conquered by
the working classes themselves.
The struggle for the emancipation of the working classes means
not a struggle for class privileges and monopolies, but for equal rights
and duties and the abolition of all class rule.
The economical subjection of the man of labor to the monopolizer
of the means of labor, that is the sources of life, lies at the bottom of
servitude in all its forms, of all social misery, mental degradation and
political dependence ;
The economical emancipation of the working classes is therefore
the great end to which every political movement ought to be subor-
dinate as a means.
All efforts aiming at that great end have hitherto failed from the
want of solidarity between the manifold divisions of labor in each
country and from the absence of a fraternal bond of union between
the working classes of different countries. The emancipation of
labor is neither a local, nor a national, but a social problem embracing
all countries, in which modern society exists and depending for its
solution on the concurrence, practical and theoretical, of the most
advanced countries.
The National Labor Congress at Cincinnati, August,
1870, and the N.Y. State Workingmen's Assembly, Jan-
uary, 1871, both passed resolutions acknowledging and
recommending the principles of the I.W.A.
FELLOW- WORKINGMEN ! This Central Committee is
in duty bound to make every effort for uniting the work-
ing classes of this country and to collect everything tend-
ing to enlighten them on their own condition. Recog-
nizing this, as you surely will, also as an important duty
of yours, you are hereby solicited to enter into communi-
cations with us and to report to us everything at your
disposal referring to the condition of your trade and asso-
ciates as well as in general of workingmen in your dis-
trict. We are willing and ready to reciprocate with all
due care and dispatch.
A full and clear knowledge of the interests of our class
will, we are satisfied, soon influence you in declaring
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 359
your affiliation to that fraternal union of the laborers of
all countries destined to break the yoke, under which the
working classes languish -the wages-slavery.
Workingmen of all countries, unite! Fraternal greet-
ing. The North American Central Committee of the
International Workingmen's Association.
THEODORE H. BANKS, CONRAD CARL, JOHN DEVOY,
EDW. GROSSE, B. HUBERT, VILEM JANTUS, L. RUPPELL,
F. A. SORGE, RUD. STARKE, - - WEISS.
All communications to be directed to
F. A. SORGE, Corr. Seer.
Box 101, Hoboken, NJ.
Copy Book, May 21, 1871, pp. 12-16.
To THE GENERAL COUNCIL, LONDON. . . The
great struggle of the Pennsylvania miners is ended by a
pretty general resumption of work in the mining dis-
tricts, mostly at somewhat advanced prices. And the
great aim of the combined capitalists, the destruction of
the Miners' and Laborers' Benevolent Association, has
not been attained, the Association standing as powerful
and influential as ever. Their General Council an-
swered our address at some length insisting on the im-
portance of their fight for all Trades and Labor Unions.
John Siney, a prominent leader of the miners, lately ad-
dressed a public meeting of Workingmen in New York
City, giving a clear and full expose of the organization
and workings of the M. and L. B. A. The monopolists
and their press have succeeded in creating a riot in one
of the mining towns, when two union members lost their
life. That seed will grow and bear appropriate fruits
in time. . .
Your communication dated March i4th, mailed April
3rd is at hand. We shall act according to the- instruc-
tions therein contained, but cannot omit to make some
360 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
remarks regarding the attitude of the General Council
towards our organization and our alleged assumption of
the name of Central Committee, hoping thereby to dis-
perse some erroneous views about our American organ-
ization.
I. Your communication contains the following pass-
age: "Still less seemed such a claim admissible in a
case, where, as in the U.S., no branches of U.S. workmen
do yet at all exist, but only branches formed by Foreign-
ers residing in the U.S." The term "foreigner" is here
undoubtedly misplaced and adopted simply by judging
our situation in America (i.e., U.S.) to be similar to the
situation of foreign workingmen in European countries.
But this is not the case for many reasons, amongst which :
(a) Workingmen from other countries arriving here do
not come with the intention of residing but temporarily
here; (b) They are in nowise regarded as foreigners or
simple residents, but as citizens, the only distinction be-
ing made by calling them sometimes adopted citizens;
(c) They not only claim to be, but are de facto et de jure
citizens of this country in full and unabridged political
right; (d) They form an important and considerable
part of this country's Trades Unions and Labor Soci-
eties, being well represented in every one, whilst some
of the most powerful and best trades organizations in
the U.S. consist almost exclusively of so-called "For-
eigners," viz. the Miners' and Laborers' Benevolent
Association, the Cigarmakers' International Union, the
Cabinetmakers' Societies, the Crispins, etc. The term
"foreigner" therefore does not apply to us at all. . .
Copy Book, June 20, 1871, pp. 26, 27.
To THE GENERAL COUNCIL. . . The old political
parties in this country, the so-called Democratic Party
leading, are fast taking up and accepting the most im-
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 361
portant parts of the platform of the National Labor
Union, and the question now arises: if there are sound
elements enough in that organization able and willing
to resurrect it and make it a genuine Workingmen's
Party with a true and distinct Labor Program. . .
The Typographical National Union lately held their
annual congress in Baltimore and refused to appoint
Delegates to the National Labor Congress. . .
Copy Book, Aug. 20, 1871, pp. 39-44. The International did not hold a
regular congress in 1871, but substituted the Conference of Delegates,
to which the following was addressed.
Since the close of the Civil War in the United States
the industrial development has delivered more and more
decidedly the production to the hands of Capital, i.e.,
to the appropriators of the accumulated means and
fruit of labor. In proof of this we only point to the
state of labor in the New England States (vide Statis-
tical Report of Bureau of Labor in Massachusetts),
Pennsylvania, California and New York. The capital-
istic production grows rapidly, but unfortunately the
consciousness of the workingman of his own class-con-
dition does not keep step with it.
We are sorry to state that the workingmen in general,
even in spite of the industrial development- are quite
unconscious of their own position towards capital and
slow to show battle against their oppressors for the fol-
lowing reasons:
I. The great majority of workingmen in the North-
ern States are Immigrants from Ireland, Germany, Eng-
land, etc. (in California coolies, imported under con-
tract) having left their native countries for the purpose
of seeking here that wealth they could not obtain at
home. This delusion transforms itself into a sort of
creed, and employers and capitalists, parvenus Raving
362 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
gained their wealth in a former period, take great care
in preserving this self-deception among their employees,
and so the German, the Irish and every other laborer
works on in the belief of finally arriving at the desired
goal, until time and experience show its utter vanity,
the capitalists themselves rendering its realization more
and more impossible. This visionary idea has been the
cornerstone in founding the trades-unions -in this coun-
try at least- whilst now it is the stumbling block over
which they fall and perish. Nevertheless a great num-
ber of workingmen cannot part with this, their favorite
idea, because their mind is constantly confused and
troubled by another medium :
II. THE REFORM PARTIES. The so-called Reform
Parties are growing up in the United States over night
and for every one disappearing there are two others
anxious and ready to step in its track. These parties as-
sert, that the emancipation of labor or rather the wel-
fare of mankind can be obtained peacefully and easily
by universal suffrage, glittering educational measures,
benevolent and homestead societies, universal language
and other schemes and systems nicely put up in their in-
numerable meetings and carried out by nobody. The
leading men of said parties, mostly men of science and
philanthropists perceive the rottenness of the governing
classes as far as relating to their own ideas of morality,
but they see only the surface of the question of labor and
accordingly all their humanitarian advices do not touch
but the exterior of it. Such a reform movement well ad-
vocated and intelligibly presented to the workingmen
is often gladly accepted, because the laborer wants to
ameliorate his position and does not perceive the hol-
lowness of that gilded nut shining before his eyes. The
daily press does not fail to point out the ridiculous parts
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 363
of those propositions, to shake them well up with the
labor question and to present that so prepared stuff and
surrogate as a new gospel to their readers.
III. The third obstacle is and has been the wrong
guidance of the labor movement itself. A number of
the so-called leaders have been actuated by ambition or
other selfish motives, whilst another number was hon-
est and true but failed to take the right steps and began
to reform, all reforms finally taking their abode in one
of the political parties of the ruling class, the burgeois.
The best proof of this is given in the platform as passed
by the first National Labor Congress at Baltimore, 1866,
compared with the platform passed in Cincinnati and
St. Louis, 1870 and 1871. Here is a synopsis of both:
1 866 -RESOLVED: i. That eight hours shall consti-
tute a legal day's work ; 2. That it'is the imperative duly
of every workingman to connect himself with his trade
organization, if any exists; and where none exists, to im-
mediately commence the formation of the same ; 3. That
in cooperation we recognize a sure and lasting reme-
dy[?] for the abuses of the present industrial system; 4.
That the system of prison labor as practiced throughout
this country is not only injurious to the producing classes
etc.; 5. That we pledge our individual and undivided
support to the sewing women and daughters of toil in
this land; 6. With regard to agricultural interests and
production of cotton in the Southern States, etc.; 7. In
regard to tenement houses, etc. ; 8. That the whole pub-
lic domain shall be disposed of only to actual settlers;
9. That this congress deprecate what is familiarly known
as strikes among workingmen, etc.
1870 and 1871 -RESOLVED, a. That laborers in all de-
partments of useful industry are suffering from a sys-
tem of monetary laws perpetuated in the interest of
364 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
bondholders and bankers; b. That the rates of interest
on money are excessive and oppressive to the producing
classes; c. That the national banking system is without
warrant in the constitution of the United States . . .
justice demands its repeal; d. That to provide a true
national currency . . . etc.; e. That the payment
of interest in gold is dishonest, etc. ; f . That justice de-
mands that the burdens of the government should be so
adjusted as to bear equally on all classes; g. That Con-
gress should so modify the tariff, etc.; h. That the
treaty-making power of the government has no power
in the constitution to dispose of the public lands without
the joint sanction of the Senate and the House of Rep-
resentatives, etc.
The first one (1866) endeavors to favor the working-
men; in the latter, 1870 and 1871, the main question is
the money-system of the United States, a question
brought up by both parties of the ruling class, whenever
an election is impending.
In the preceding are given the principal difficulties
to be overcome, the real causes of the poor condition of
the Trades Unions -especially the German ones -per-
haps leading to their entire destruction.
About the sections composing our Central Committee
we have to report that they endeavor to work constantly
and earnestly in the cause of labor. It has been the
greatest care of the C.C. to keep the Sections clear of all
political jobbers, also to inform the workingmen of
their true interests. If the result has not yet been an en-
tire success, it is not the fault of this C.C. We have
made great efforts for inducing the Irish Workingmen
of this country to join the I.W.A., but religious and
political prejudices and above all -their leaders have to
this day withstood all our efforts. A true and honest
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 365
Irish Revolutionist writes of "the wearying and very
discouraging work" among the different Irish societies,
which are all led by knaves "or their tools," etc. Still
we do not give it up and hope yet to gain a firm foothold
amongst the Irish. Since the formation of the C.C.
some new sections have been reformed in other parts of
the U.S., for instance, in St. Louis, New Orleans, San
Francisco- and another one will probably be formed in
Philadelphia.
After the sublime struggle of the Commune in Paris
the more intelligent workingmen have turned their eyes
more eagerly towards the I.W.A. This approach may
become very important for the Association. But, if this
C.C. shall not lose all advantages springing therefrom
the C.C. ought to have the undivided, unequivocal, full
support of the General Council for the following rea-
sons :
It is well known here that the Central Executive of the
I.W.A. is established at London and everything eman-
ating from there is considered as very important. Fur-
thermore the daily press has unintentionally glorified
the General Council so much that their (the G.C.'s)
moral influence is highly increased. If the Central
Committee shall be enabled to use this moral influence
in favor of the cause of labor- the General Council
must show more confidence and give more ready support
to the Central Committee than heretofore.
This C.C. is predominantly composed of wages labor-
ers who, working in workshops and being trades-union-
ists, know the condition of the workingmen, we believe,
as well, if not better, than men who never have been ac-
tive producers, or men who are not connected with either
trades unions nor workingmen generally. Nevertheless
it appears to us that the General Council paid more at-
366 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
tention till now to those scribblers than to the Central
Committee.
The revolutionary proletariat here will probably for
some time to come not be directly attacked by the ruling
classes and this time of tranquillity, wisely used, may be-
come of great importance not only to us here but to the
I.W.A. in general. To take hold of this advantage for
the purpose of strengthening the I.W.A. in this country,
we repeat here, a lively, confident, frank intercourse be-
tween the General Council and this Central Committee
is necessary. Fraternal Greeting
The North American Central Committee of the I.W.A.
New York, August 2Oth, 1871.
THEODORE H. BANKS, FR. BOLTE, CONRAD CARL, D.
DEBUCHY, JOHN DEVOY, F. FILLY, E. GROSSE, B. HU-
BERT, TH. MILLOT AINE, L. RUPPEL, R. STARKE, GEO.
STIEBELING, TH. WEISS, WM. WEST.
by order F. A. SORGE, Corr. Seer.
Box 101, Hoboken, N.J., via New York.
Copy Book, Sept. 3, 1871, pp. 47, 48.
To THE GENERAL COUNCIL. . . The National
Labor Union held its annual congress at St. Louis Au-
gust yth-ioth. On the first day not a sufficient number
of delegates was present to transact business, whilst to-
ward the close of the congress about twenty delegates
were voting. (The Congress at Cincinnati last year yet
numbered more than one hundred bona fide delegates.)
They simply reaffirmed their former platform with this
only addition: "that capital invested in railroads, tele-
graphs, etc., should not earn more than six per cent
interest." The leaders of the N.L.U. have learned
nothing and, it is to be feared, will never learn to under-
stand the labor question. All the great trades organiza-
tions having withdrawn previously with the single ex-
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 367
ception of the miners, the Congress can hardly be called
a Workingmen's Convention. . . We will not omit
to state, that they were very careful and anxiously trying
not to mention the word "Commune" in their proceed-
ings. They adjourned to meet next year (?) still far-
ther off the industrial districts, at Nashville, Tennes-
see. . .
C.of>y Book, Oct. i, 1871, pp. 60-64.
To THE GENERAL COUNCIL. . . An event per-
haps marking a new era and a new departure in the
labor movement was the great eight hours demonstra-
tion of Sept. 1 3th, in New York City, already announced
in our last report. It had been raining the entire morn-
ing and the streets were in a deplorable state, but the
New York Trades Unions turned out and carried the
day. About twenty thousand wofkingmen were in line
and everything passed off well. The mass-meeting at
night was crowded, the speakers all from labor's ranks,
and the resolutions significant in their threatening tone
to the authorities, and in their conclusion recommending
in a somewhat covert manner the expropriation and ex-
ploitation for the peoples benefit of all mines, means of
transportation and communication, etc. Our resident
sections taking part in the procession they were the ob-
ject of great curiosity and marked attention, and shouts
of "Vive la Commune" often greeted them. But espe-
cially cordial was the reception of the Internationals by
the Trades-Unionists at the final countermarch of the
procession and deafening cheers greeted the appearance
of their banner (the red flag) on the stage at the mass-
meeting. Equally significant was the participation of
colored (negro) organizations for the first time in a
demonstration got up by the English speaking unions
(the German Unions having treated them as equals
3 68 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
already years ago). Altogether the effect of this bril-
liant demonstration is not to be underrated. A new start
has been given to the labor movement and is being felt
all over the country. The bonds of brotherhood be-
tween the different trades unions and labor societies
have been fastened. The I.W.A. appearing for the first
time on the scene within the ranks of the trades union-
ists thereby gained largely in esteem and soon will prob-
ably gain in members. And last, but not least, a per-
manent all-combining organization of the N.Y. work-
men will in all probability spring from it and spread
even farther. Our sections had prepared for the occa-
sion an extract from K. Marx 7 Das Kapital, translated
it into English, printed and distributed it in thousands
of copies, which were very well received. A copy is
enclosed. . .
The intention of politicians and others is now pretty
clear: to identify the I.W.A. in this country with the
woman suffrage, free love and other movements and we
will have to struggle hard for clearing ourselves from
these imputations.
Copy Book, Nov. 5, 1871, pp. 70-72.
To THE GENERAL COUNCIL, LONDON. . . Out of
the great and very promising eight hours convention of
this city has grown a local political movement. But
the masses of the N.Y. City workmen are not yet willing
to introduce politics into their trades societies, and no
organization of the working classes is behind the politi-
cal movement, which therefore must prove futile and
unsuccessful -a result much to be deplored because it
will make a number of honest true workingmen indif-
ferent for future action. Not underrating the value of
political action, especially as a means of agitation, we
maintain that an extended and somewhat perfected or-
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMFl'S 369
ganization must precede any political movement of the
working classes.
The Labor Reform Party in the coal mining districts
of Pennsylvania were defeated in the late election,
though drawing great force from that powerful Miners'
and Laborers' Benevolent Association numbering over
thirty thousand members in about five counties. Their
leaders and organs ascribe their defeat to the rumor and
popular belief of their understanding and agreement
with the "International" and the Paris Commune; and
for the purpose of protecting themselves against this
terrible accusation their General Council lately passed a
resolution disclaiming all connection with the I.W.A.
and the "Commune" and asserting their belief in the
omnipotence of the ballot. In Massachusetts the Labor
Party is also at work but somewhat differently. Their
platform maintains primarily: "That Labor, the crea-
tor of wealth, is entitled to all it creates" -and therefore
declares "War to the wages system." Some of the
speeches made there redound with praises of the I.W.A.
and the "Commune." . .
Copy Book, Dec. 17, 1871, pp. 77-84.
To THE GENERAL COUNCIL, LONDON. . . In the
coal districts of Pennsylvania the National Labor Union
is still defending itself against the terrible accusation
of being affiliated or somehow connected with the I.W.A.
and the "Commune." Provision has also been made for
organizing secretly the so-called labor unions ( local soci-
eties) affiliating with the National Labor Union. . .
A third Irish section has been formed in N.Y. City, a
French one in Paterson and one ditto in Philadelphia, a
Scandinavian section in Chicago, an English speaking
section in San Francisco, a second German section in
Philadelphia and a third German one in Chicago.
37 o AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
More sections are about to be formed in several other
places. . .
Copy Book, pp. 156-159.
New York, 10 Ward Hotel, January 29th, 1873.
To the Officers and Members of the Workingmen's
Assembly of the State of New York.
FELLOW WORKINGMEN : On the i9th of May, 1872,
an appeal was issued to the Workingmen of America,
explaining the aims and principles of the International
Workingmen's Association and warning our colaborers
against certain parties of political reformers intruding
themselves into the ranks of labor either for selfish pur-
poses or for advancing some hobbies of their own by the
aid of the working people.
Since that time the press of this country- aimed[?]
and subsidized by capital - did its best to poison the mind
of the working man against the Internationals and their
doings. Every movement, political or not, connected
with the great cause of labor or not, was made use of
by these manufacturers of public opinion to ridicule the
I.W.A. by calling Internationals all those individuals,
who arrogantly and impudently use the name of the
association of international workingmen without having
the slightest idea of its principles and aims. For this
reason the I.W.A. is so frequently misunderstood and its
aims misconstrued amongst workingmen especially
when the[y] know the I.W.A. only by hearsay.
Now, who are the internationals and what, are their
aims? [illegible in manuscript] The emancipation of
labour is [illegible] workingmen themselves.
That is: the lifting up of the workingman from that
low position he now occupies in a society which guar-
antees all the benefits of labor to the employer and noth-
ing to the producer- in a society where freedom and
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 371
comfort is secured only to the rich, whilst the poor have
to choose between starvation or selling their working
power for a price fixed by the employer ; that is : the ele-
vation of the oppressed to a position where equal rights
and duties are enjoyed by every human being.
All Workingmen, who believe that their aim can [be]
attained by a combination of the men of labor not only
of one country, but of all countries are Internationals
and their organization is the I.W.A.
The different trades unions are aiming at the same
end - the elevation of the working classes - by claiming a
fair remuneration for a fair day's work and thus making
a fair step toward the final emancipation of labor by
abolishing wages at last and substituting associative labor
for private enterprise.
The growth of capitalistic association and monetary
institutions has placed the working class in a position
worthy to be remembered.
When the great war broke out, by which slavery in
the South was abolished, all the coin and specie of our
wealthy people disappeared suddenly and the U.S. Gov-
ernment was obliged to contract immense debts in form
of the so called U.S. bonds. No sooner had these bonds
appeared, when the hidden treasures came forth again,
and the bonds went into the hands of our honest appro-
priators, who used a small part of the profits of this fat
job towards bringing substitutes, i.e., men exposing
themselves to the bullet of the enemy for a little blood
money. When the war was ended through the exertion
of our brave fellow working men soldiers, they returned
to their homes only to be worked harder than ever for
paying the interest of those bonds to the very men who
had doubled their fortunes by nice bond-speculations
without ever risking the loss of a farthing nor the afflic-
372 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
tion of a scratch in that momentous struggle of the na-
tion. In short the working men had to perform the
double mission of fighting and offering their lives for a
government composed of bondholders and their friends,
and at the end of the struggle, of paying the debts con-
tracted for the benefit of the wealthy. And thus it stands
today.
Now, fellow workingmen, how long will you endure
this miserable position of working for a poor living and
enriching the employers, your masters? No change of
it can be effected as long as we are not united.
False prophets will tell you: every workingman must
become independent, a capitalist himself, and then the
struggle will cease. A complete absurdity!
Suppose the whole mass of labourers becoming capi-
talists, who would perform the necessary work for pre-
serving the society? Some other Reformers -would-be
workingmen or their professed friends are preaching
universal freedom, free love, universal suffrage and more
such universalities. These men too are false reformers
and frequently in the service of the capitalists. And even
when they are not in the direct pay of the monopolists,
the capitalistic press will and does use their shallow
phrases to ridicule our great and just cause. They can-
not be our men !
We have protested already, we protest again against
the saddling of the I.W.A. with all the nonsense, hum-
bug and laughing stock issued and issuing from false
friends of the I.W.A. especially from a body misnaming
itself the Federal Council of the I.W.A. and meeting
formerly in Prince Str. presently in Spring Str., N.Y.
We earnestly warn all workingmen affiliating with them.
Fellow workingmen! Throw off all those hobbies,
which bogus reformers and small political quacks are
only too ready to impose upon you, let our watch word
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 373
be: Workingmen of all countries unitel and once unit-
ed we will be near the accomplishment of our great aim :
The Emancipation of labor.
By ord. of the Federal Council I.W. A. fraternal greet-
ings, F. BOLTE, Gnrl. Sy.
(b) AN INTERNATIONAL TRADE UNION
Sorge Ms. f 84-86 [translation from the German].
The manuscript of F. A. Sorge, at the University of Wisconsin, consists
of copies of the correspondence of the General Council with the severr.1
branches after its transfer from London to New York.
GENERAL COUNCIL of the I.W.A. to the "United
Carpenters" of New York.
The Gen. C. ordered me to transmit to you the follow-
ing communication: In the beginning of April of this
year the "United Carpenters" of Liege declared their
approval of the plan for International Trade Unions as
proposed by the G. C. [general council]. At the same
time they asked for addresses of trade-unions. On April
1 8 the G.C. wrote to them that a convention of carpen-
ters of this country was going to take place in June, and
furnished them with the address of the United Carpen-
ters of New York. On the 6th of June the G.C. received
a reply in the form of a circular letter setting forth a
provisional constitution together with a communica-
tion that the contemplated congress of the United Car-
penters at Brussels is postponed from August to Sep-
tember "in order to wait for the delegates from the
U.S." An exchange of communications is facilitated,
which will help to make the position clear. The fol-
lowing is a translation of the Federal Constitution, as it
was provisionally accepted at Liege on April 2Oth and
28th.
ARTICLE i. A general federation of carpenters and
cabinetmakers is formed [menuisiers et charpentiers].
ARTICLE 2. Each affiliating society is obliged to be
374 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
democratic and socialistic [demokratisch u. socialistisch,
democratique et social e~\.
ARTICLE 3. The federation has as its aim the better-
ment of the position of the carpenters and cabinetmak-
ers. It holds as its duty to make active propaganda in
the sense of article 2.
ARTICLE 4. The Federation holds annual congresses
and decides on a center for correspondence. It decides
about extraordinary congresses.
ARTICLE 5. The congresses should be held alternative-
ly in different localities where the interests of labor are
most taken to heart.
ARTICLE 6. Before the adjournment of each congress
the place of meeting of the next congress should be de-
cided upon. Each section pays the expenses of its dele-
gate.
ARTICLE 7. Each union has a right to one delegate and
one vote in the national congresses. In the international
congresses each country has one vote. Resolutions are
adopted with a plain majority of votes.
ARTICLE 8. Each union elects from its midst a cor-
responding secretary, who is obliged to communicate
to the center every three months about the situation of
his union and about everything pertaining to the fed-
eration.
ARTICLE 9. The treasuries of the affiliated unions re-
main independent.
ARTICLE 10. Each affiliated union obligates itself by
adopting the present constitution to hinder its members
from taking the jobs of comrades, who are engaged in a
struggle f any kind -as well as to encourage by all
means the feeling of solidarity among carpenters and
cabinetmakers.
ARTICLE 11. Each member who is in good standing
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 375
with any affiliated society, is by virtue of that a member
of every other affiliated society in every place wherever
he may go. The address of the Liege carpenters is:
A. D. Brouet, impasse Bidaut No. 14, Liege, Belgium.
With brotherly greetings by order of the G. C.
New York, June 6, 1873. F. A. SORGE, Gen. Seer.
Sorgc Ms., Aug. n, 1873, pp. 118, 123.
REPORT OF THE GENERAL COUNCIL to the Congress
at Geneva, 1873. . . The G.C. having been charged
with the special mission to establish the International
Trades Unions, we have issued a plan, sent it to the dif-
ferent countries and had it reproduced in different or-
gans of the I.W.A. Answers were received from the
"united cabinet makers" of Liege Belgium, who sent in
their adhesion to the plan, and from the "united cabinet-
makers of New York to the same purpose. A congress
of all workmen in the manufacture of furniture lately
held at Cincinnati (here) organized a union of their
trades, created a central body (for the current year, New
York) and directed their executive to establish intimate
relations with the organized workingmen's central bod-
ies of all countries. . . The German trades-unions
are nearly all organized on a true international basis,
but not very strong yet and prevented by law from oper-
ating outside of the empire's frontier. . . In our
opinion the plan of International Trades Unions is not
yet mature for final decision and congress should recom-
mend renewed efforts to all federations, groups and sec-
tions, charge the G.C. to continue its labors in that direc-
tion and postpone the final agreement to the next con-
gress. . .
37 6 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
(c) A NATIONALIZED INTERNATIONAL: THE
UNITED WORKERS OF AMERICA, 1874
General Rules of the Association of United Workers of America, 1874,
leaflet, pp. 2, 3. Italics indicate wording identical with the General
Rules of the I. W. A. as adopted in 1864. Brackets indicate wording
of the Internationals omitted from that of the United Workers.
FORM OF PLEDGE. I, , do hereby most solemnly
pledge myself to support, maintain, and propagate the
principles of the "Association of United Workers of
America," as set forward in the preamble to the general
rules ; to conform with all its regulations, and to fulfill
my duties as a member to the utmost of my power. For
the furtherance of the principles of the "Association of
United Workers," I most solemnly disavow all alliance
with existing American political parties, or with any
other American political party which may be hereafter
established, and which will not aim at the emancipation
of labor.
GENERAL RULES of the Association of United Work-
ers of America. Considering, that the emancipation of
the working classes must be .accomplished [conquered]
by the working classes themselves -that the struggle for
their emancipation means [not] a struggle [for class
privileges and monopolies but] for equal rights and
duties, and the abolition of all class rule.
That the economical subjection of the man of labor
to the monopolizer of the means of labor [that is the
sources of life] lies at the bottom of servitude in all its
forms, of [all] social misery, mental degradation and
political dependence.
That the economical emancipation of the working
classes is, therefore, the great end to which every politi-
cal movement ought to be subordinate as a means.
That all efforts aiming at that great end have hitherto
failed from the want of solidarity between the manifold
nine] INTERNATIONAL ATTEMPTS 377
divisions of labor in each country [and from the absence
of a fraternal bond of union between the working classes
of different countries. That the emancipation of labour
is neither a local nor a national, but a social problem,
embracing all countries in which modern society exists,
and depending for its solution on the concurrence, prac-
tical and theoretical, of the most advanced countries;
that the present revival of the working classes in the most
industrious countries of Europe, while it raises a new
hope, gives solemn warning against a relapse into the old
errors, and calls for the immediate combination of the
still disconnected movements.]
That the social emancipation of the working classes is
inseparable from their political emancipation.
That against the collective power of the capitalist
classes, the working classes cannot Act as a class, except
by constituting themselves into a political party, distinct
from and opposed to all parties formed by the capitalist
classes.
That this constitution of the working class into a poli-
tical party is indispensable in order to insure the triumph
of the social revolution and its ultimate end -the aboli-
tion of classes.
That in the United States of America, as in all other
countries, the working classes are still unemancipated
and victims of class rule.
For these reasons, the Association of United Work-
ers of America has been founded.
It declares: that all [societies and] individuals ad-
hering to itwill acknowledge Truth, Justice and Moral-
ity as the basis of their conduct towards each other and
towards all men without regard to color, creed or na-
tionality.
That it will endeavor by all possible means to facili-
37 8 AMERICAN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY [Vol.
tate, by mutual intercourse and exchange of thoughts
and ideas, in periodical meetings, a fraternal union
amongst the working classes, and this with a view to
acquire and propagate a knowledge of the great social
principles and aspirations, calculated to lead to and cul-
minate in a practical solution of the mighty problem of
modern society -the Emancipation of Labor.
That it is the duty of all its members to support only
those political movements which aim directly at the
economical emancipation of the man of labor.
That it acknowledges no rights without duties no
duties without rights. And, in this spirit, the following
rules have been adopted:
1st. This Association is established to afford a central
medium of communication and co-operation between
[Workingmen's Societies existing in different countries
and aiming at the same end, viz.,] the toilers of America,
and for the protection, advancement and complete eman-
cipation of the working classes.
2d. The name of the Society shall be "The Associa-
tion of United Workers of America." . .
The Central Committee: D. KRONBERG, MARTIN
DOYLE, GEO. H. FORDE, D. WHOLEY, M. J. MCCLOS-
KEY, J. HARVEY; J. H. MONCKTON, Fin.-secretary; C.
MALONE, Rec.-secretary; JOSEPH ALLEN, Treasurer; F.
BOLTE, Cor.-secretary, German Language, 123 Chrystie
St., N.Y. City; J. P. MCDONNELL, Cor.-secretary, Eng-
lish Language, 118 Smith St., Brooklyn, N.Y.
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO
LIBRARY
Acme Library Card Pocket
Under Pat. "Ref. Index File."
Made by LIBEABY BUREAU, Boston
