SWBAT: Explain how government responded to confrontations between labor and management

 HIPP these cartoons with your partner: 1 2

 Pre-Civil War: labor unions local & for skilled workers only (ex. Philadelphia shoemakers, New York printers)  Post-Civil War: rise in national labor unions

 NATIONAL LABOR UNION (NLU)  1866: 1 st attempt to organize all workers in all states (skilled & unskilled, agricultural & industrial)  Leader: William Sylvis  Gained 640,000 members in 2 years  Goals: higher wages, 8-hour day, equal rights for women & blacks, monetary reform & worker cooperatives  Victory: won 8-hour day for federal employees  Lost support after a depression began in 1873 & after the unsuccessful strikes of 1877

 KNIGHTS OF LABOR  1869: 2 nd national labor union began as a secret society in order to avoid detection by employers  Leader: Terence Powderly  1881: Opened membership to include blacks & women  Goals: abolition of child labor & abolition of monopolies/trusts, settle labor disputes by through arbitration, rather than strikes  Loosely organized  could not control local units  Grew rapidly in early 1880s, peak membership 730,000  Declined after Haymarket Riot in Chicago turned public opinion against the union

 AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR (AF o L)  1886: association of 25 craft unions  Concentrated on economic goals  Leader: Samuel Gompers  Goals: “Bread and Butter”; higher wages & improved working conditions (directed unions of skilled workers to walk out until employer agreed to negotiate new contract through collective bargaining)  1901: the nation's largest union with 1 million members  Did not achieve major successes until early 20th century  still exists today!

 LOCKOUT: Closing the factory to break a labor movement before it could get organized  BLACKLISTS: Names of pro-union workers circulated among employers  YELLOW-DOG CONTRACTS: Workers told, as a condition for employment, they must sign an agreement not to join a union  PRIVATE GUARDS & STATE MILITIA: Called in to put down strikes  COURT INJUNCTIONS: Obtained to stop strikes

 With a surplus of cheap labor, management held most of the power in its struggles with organized labor  Strikers could easily be replaced by bringing in strikebreakers (“scabs”) who were unemployed, desperate for jobs

 With your partner, analyze and discuss the “Major Labor Strikes: ”  Similarities/Differences?  How did the government respond?  Result of each strike? Pattern?

 Finish this sentence:  Increasing tensions between workers & employers led to … large, violent, often unsuccessful strikes stopped by the Federal Government

Tensions increase between workers & owners Workers organize unions Business owners oppose unions Era of strikes begins with Railroad Strike, 1877 Major strikes continue Government sides with business owners, using army to put down strikes Gap between rich & poor