A History of Trade Unionism in the United States

by Selig Perlman

Whatever reasons moved the trade unions of the skilled to battle with the Order for their separate and autonomous existence were bound sooner or later to induce those craftsmen who were in the Order to seek a similar autonomy. From the very beginning the more skilled and better organized trades in the Knights sought to separate from the mixed "district assemblies" and to create within the framework of the Order "national trade assemblies."[26] However, the national officers, who looked upon such a move as a betrayal of the great principle of the solidarity of all labor, were able to stem the tide excepting in the case of the window glass blowers, who were granted their autonomy in 1880.

The obvious superiority of the trade union form of organization over the mixed organization, as revealed by events in 1886 and 1887, strengthened the separatist tendency. Just as the struggle between the Knights of Labor and the trade unions on the outside had been fundamentally a struggle between the unskilled and the skilled portions of the wage-earning class, so the aspiration toward the national trade assembly within the Order represented the effort of the more or less skilled men for emancipation from the dominance of the unskilled. But the Order successfully fought off such attempts until after the defeat of the mixed district assemblies, or in other words of the unskilled class, in the struggle with the employers. With the withdrawal of a very large portion of this class, as shown in 1887,[27] the demand for the national trade assembly revived and there soon began a veritable rush to organize by trades. The stampede was strongest in the city of New York where the incompetence of the mixed District Assembly 49 had become patent. At the General Assembly in 1887 at Minneapolis all obstacles were removed from forming national trade assemblies, but this came too late to stem the exodus of the skilled element from the order into the American Federation of Labor.

The victory of craft autonomy over the "one big union" was decisive and complete.

The strike activities of the Knights were confessedly a deviation from "First Principles." Yet the First Principles with their emphasis on producers' cooperation were far from forgotten even when the enthusiasm for strikes was at its highest. Whatever the actual feelings of the membership as a whole, the leaders neglected no opportunity to promote cooperation. T.V. Powderly, the head of the Order since 1878, in his reports to the annual General Assembly or convention, consistently urged that practical steps be taken toward cooperation. In 1881, while the general opinion in the Order was still undecided, the leaders did not scruple to smuggle into the constitution a clause which made cooperation compulsory.

Notwithstanding Powderly's exhortations, the Order was at first slow in taking it up. In 1882 a general cooperative board was elected to work out a plan of action, but it never reported, and a new board was chosen in its place at the Assembly of 1883. In that year, the first practical step was taken in the purchase by the Order of a coal mine at Cannelburg, Indiana, with the idea of selling the coal at reduced prices to the members. Soon thereafter a thorough change of sentiment with regard to the whole matter of cooperation took place, contemporaneously with the industrial depression and unsuccessful strikes. The rank and file, who had hitherto been indifferent, now seized upon the idea with avidity. The enthusiasm ran so high in Lynn, Massachusetts, that it was found necessary to raise the shares of the Knights of Labor Cooperative Shoe Company to $100 in order to prevent a large influx of "unsuitable members." In 1885 Powderly complained that "many of our members grow impatient and unreasonable because every avenue of the Order does not lead to cooperation."

The impatience for immediate cooperation, which seized the rank and file in practically every section of the country, caused an important modification in the official doctrine of the Order. Originally it had contemplated centralized control under which it would have taken years before a considerable portion of the membership could realize any benefit. This was now dropped and a decentralized plan was adopted. Local organizations and, more frequently, groups of members with the financial aid of their local organizations now began to establish shops. Most of the enterprises were managed by the stockholders, although, in some cases, the local organization of the Knights of Labor managed the plant.

Most of the cooperative enterprises were conducted on a small scale. Incomplete statistics warrant the conclusion that the average amount invested per establishment was about $10,000. From the data gathered it seems that cooperation reached its highest point in 1886, although it had not completely spent itself by the end of 1887. The total number of ventures probably reached two hundred. The largest numbers were in mining, cooperage, and shoes. These industries paid the poorest wages and treated their employes most harshly. A small amount of capital was required to organize such establishments.

With the abandonment of centralized cooperation in 1884, the role of the central cooperative board changed correspondingly. The leading member of the board was now John Samuel, one of those to whom cooperation meant nothing short of a religion. The duty of the board was to educate the members of the Order in the principles of cooperation; to aid by information and otherwise prospective and actual cooperators; in brief, to coordinate the cooperative movement within the Order. It issued forms of a constitution and by-laws which, with a few modifications, could be adopted by any locality. It also published articles on the dangers and pitfalls in cooperative ventures, such as granting credit, poor management, etc., as well as numerous articles on specific kinds of cooperation. The Knights of Labor label was granted for the use of cooperative goods and a persistent agitation was steadily conducted to induce purchasers to give a preference to cooperative products.

As a scheme of industrial regeneration, cooperation never materialized. The few successful shops sooner or later fell into the hands of an "inner group," who "froze out" the others and set up capitalistic partnerships. The great majority went on the rocks even before getting started. The causes of failure were many: Hasty action, inexperience, lax shop discipline, internal dissensions, high rates of interest upon the mortgage of the plant, and finally discriminations instigated by competitors. Railways were heavy offenders, by delaying side tracks and, on some pretext or other, refusing to furnish cars or refusing to haul them.

The Union Mining Company of Cannelburg, Indiana, owned and operated by the Order as its sole experiment of the centralized kind of cooperation, met this fate. After expending $20,000 in equipping the mine, purchasing land, laying tracks, cutting and sawing timber on the land and mining $1000 worth of coal, they were compelled to lie idle for nine months before the railway company saw fit to connect their switch with the main track. When they were ready to ship their product, it was learned that their coal could be utilized for the manufacture of gas only, and that contracts for supply of such coal were let in July, that is nine months from the time of connecting the switch with the main track. In addition, the company was informed that it must supply itself with a switch engine to do the switching of the cars from its mine to the main track, at an additional cost of $4000. When this was accomplished they had to enter the market in competition with a bitter opponent who had been fighting them since the opening of the mine. Having exhausted their funds and not seeing their way clear to securing additional funds for the purchase of a locomotive and to tide over the nine months ere any contracts for coal could be entered into, they sold out to their competitor.