The Hirsch-Duncker unions were the first in the field. They were organized in 1868 by Dr. Hirsch and Herr Franz Duncker, for the purpose of winning the labor vote for the Progressists. Dr. Hirsch went to England for his model, but the political bias he imparted to the unions was very un-English. They have grown less political and more neutral in every aspect, probably because political radicalism has dwindled, and because they contain a great many of the most skilled of German workmen, the machinists. They are a sort of aristocracy of labor, prefer peace to war, and hesitate long before striking.
The Christian unions are strongest in the Rhine valley and the Westphalian mining districts. They are the offspring of Bishop Kettler's workingmen's associations, organized to keep the laborer in harmony with the Roman Catholic Church. They have undergone a great deal of change since the days of the distinguished bishop, and are now modeled after strict trade-union principles. They retain their connection with the Church and the Center Party (the Roman Catholic group in the Reichstag). For some years there has been a restlessness among these unions. The more militant members are protesting against the influence of the clergy in union affairs, and demand that laborers lead labor.
The "Yellow" unions stand in bad repute among the others. They are for peace at any price. Their membership is largely composed of the engineering trades; and they are usually under contract not to strike, but settle their differences by arbitration. The employing firms contribute liberally to their union funds.
By far the largest unions are the Social Democratic or "Free" unions. They embrace over eighty per cent. of all organized labor. Their growth has been very rapid during the last twenty years. In 1890, when the Socialist law was lifted, they numbered a little over 250,000; in 1910 they numbered nearly 2,000,000.
As organizations, the Social Democratic unions possess all the perfection of detail and painstaking craftsmanship for which the Germans are justly celebrated.[2] Not the minutest detail is omitted; everything is done to contribute to the solidarity of the working classes. The theory of the German labor movement is, that physical environment is the first desideratum. A well-housed, well-groomed, well-fed workman is a better fighter than a hungry, ragged man; and it is for fighting that the unions exist. The bed-rock of the German workingman's theory is the maxim: "First, be a good craftsman, and all other things will be added unto you."
These unions strive to do everything within their power to make, first, a good workman; second, a comfortable workman. This naturally, without artificial stimulants, brings the solidarity, the class patriotism, which is the source of the zeal and energy of these great fighting machines. In all of the larger towns they own clubhouses (Gewerkschaftshäuser), which are the centers of incessant activity. They contain assembly halls, restaurants, committee rooms, and lodgings for journeymen and apprentices (Wander-bursche) seeking work. There are night classes, public lectures, educational excursions, and circulating libraries. In Berlin the workingmen have organized a theater.[3]
The workingman has a genuine sympathy for his union. It enlists his loyalty as much as his country enlists his patriotism. He finds social and intellectual intercourse, sympathy and responsiveness in his union. He saves from his frugal wages to support the union and to swell the funds in its war-chest. He is never allowed to forget that he is first a workingman, and owes his primary duties to his family and his union.[4]
This vast and perfect organization of labor has a complete understanding with the Social Democratic party, but it is not an integral part of the party. When the unions began to revive, after the repeal of the anti-Socialist law, there was a short and severe struggle between the party and the unions for control. The victory of the unions for complete autonomy was decisive. Since then good feeling and harmony have prevailed. The governing committees of the two bodies meet for consultation, the powerful press of the party fights the union's battles, and often party headquarters are in the union's clubhouse. They are virtually two independent branches of the same movement.
In the national triennial convention of the Social Democratic unions at Hamburg, 1908, a speaker said: "We can say with truth that to-day there are no differences of a fundamental nature between the two great branches [the Social Democratic unions and the Social Democratic Party] of the labor movement."[5]
Bebel has said of the relation between the unions and the party: "Every workingman should belong to the union, and should be a party man; not merely as a laboring man, but as a class-conscious (Classenbewustsein) laboring man; as a member of a governmental and a social organization which treats and maltreats him as a laboring man."[6] This is the class spirit of Socialism, carried into practical effect.