strikes, violence, and united demands LABOR UNIONS CHALLENGE BIG BUSINESS

WHY DO WE MISS SCHOOL ON LABOR DAY? tory-of-labor-day

 Organizations formed by workers to advocate for change and to protect their interests  Laborers’ grievances:  Seven day work-week  12+ hours of work per day  Not entitled to vacation  No sick leave  No unemployment compensation  No reimbursement for injuries  Low wages:  Children = 27 cents/day  Women = $267/year  Men = $498/year  Andrew Carnegie = $23 million/year LABOR UNIONS

 Founded in 1869  Membership in this labor union was officially open to all workers, regardless of race, gender, or degree of skill  Supported an 8-hour workday  Advocated equal pay for men and women doing the same work KNIGHTS OF LABOR

 Formed in 1886 by Samuel Gompers  Negotiated between labor and management on hours, wages, and working conditions  Their strikes led to higher wages and a shorter work week AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR

 Union founded by radical workers and socialists in 1905  Advocated government control of business and property in order to achieve equal distribution of wealth  Members known as Wobblies INDUSTRIAL WORKERS OF THE WORLD

 July 1877  Workers for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad struck to protest their second wage cut in two months  Trains on over 50,000 miles of track were stopped for more than a week  Federal troops intervened when states said that strikes were impeding interstate commerce GREAT RAILROAD STRIKE OF 1877

 In May 1886, 3,000 people gathered at Chicago’s Haymarket Square to protest police brutality  When police arrived, someone threw a bomb into the police line  Police fired on the crowd; seven police officers and several workers died in the chaos  No one knows who threw the bomb, but this event started to turn the public against the labor movement HAYMARKET RIOT

 Workers at the Carnegie Steel Company called a strike in June 1892 after the company president announced his plan to cut wages  Guards were hired from the Pinkerton Detective Agency to protect the plant so that strikebreakers, known as scabs, could keep it operating  The steelworkers forced out the guards and kept the plant closed until the Pennsylvania National Guard arrived almost two weeks later  By the time the strike had ended, the union had lost much of its support HOMESTEAD STRIKE

 During the Panic of 1893 and the depression that followed, the Pullman company laid off more than half of its employees  Employees who stayed had their wages cut by 25 to 50 percent  A strike was called in spring 1894  Pullman hired strikebreakers and the strike turned violent  President Grover Cleveland sent in federal troops to break up the strike PULLMAN STRIKE

 What do you think was the greatest success or failure of labor unions? EXIT TICKET