Were the combinations on both sides which enter into these agreements conterminous with the entire trades which they represent, and especially if the trades were protected from foreign competition, the interests of the general unorganized mass of consumers might conceivably suffer from these agreements.
As regards the future prospects of trade unions in Great Britain it is difficult to prophesy. The hopes of those who look for a universal expansion of these organizations so as to include the whole or the majority of the members of the manual-labour classes are probably extravagant. Not less chimerical is the expectation of the opponents of trade unions that a few defeats at the hands of determined employers or employers' organizations will permanently cripple them and lead to their decay and extinction. Probably for many years trade unions will include, as now, in their membership a powerful minority of the working classes, wielding an influence out of all proportion to their actual numbers. It is to be expected that experience and the spread of education may cause them gradually to abandon the rules and methods which interfere most with the economical application of labour and capital to industry.
Lastly, it may be pointed out that trade unionism has been the result of the growth of a class of manual workmen working for wages for employers who provide the materials and instruments of industry, and into whose ranks it is relatively difficult for the average workman to rise. It remains to be proved whether the class feeling which enables powerful trade unions to flourish can permanently be fostered and maintained except among workmen who expect to remain workmen most of their lives. If these conditions should be materially altered, trade unionism in its present form must decay or undergo a profound alteration. (X.)
IV. United States
Trade unions in the United States are best treated from the broad standpoint of labour organizations generally, i.e. associations of wage-earners having for their general purpose the improvement of their members, either through a lessened working day, increased wages, or more satisfactory rules and conditions of employment. They may or may not admit employers, but as a rule they do not admit them. Sometimes they are formed for a specific purpose, like the Eight-Hours League, but generally they have platforms comprehending all the demands which labour Labour Organization. usually makes. Labour organizations in the United States cannot be given a definite birthday. Prior to 1825 there were very few of them. In colonial days we have hints of their existence, but their purpose was partly political, and their membership often consisted of politicians. The purpose of the Caulkers' Club, in the early days of Massachusetts, was “to lay plans for introducing certain persons into places of trust and power.” Tradition has it that the word “caucus” was derived from this club. It is also said that Samuel Adams's father, as early as 1724, was active in the club's work. There was probably a union of journeymen bakers in the city of New York in 1741 and of shoemakers in Philadelphia in 1792. The shipwrights of New York City were incorporated on the 3rd of April 1803, and the tailors and carpenters of that city were organized in 1806. The New York Typographical Society was in existence in 1817, and was probably organized in the early years of the 19th century. Peter Force was its president for a time, and Thurlow Weed was a member. A strike occurred in Mr Weed's office in 1821 on account of the employment of a non-union man, who was then designated a “rat.” In 1823 was organized the Columbian Charitable Society of Shipwrights and Caulkers of Boston and Charlestown.
The period from 1825 to 1860 may be called the formative period. About 1825, and for some years afterwards, there was a Formative Period. general discussion of socialistic theories, growing out Robert Owen's experiments at New Lanark, in Scotland, and out of his communistic attempt at New Harmony, Indiana, in 1825. The wave of philosophic transcendentalism also, which swept over the country between 1825 and 1840, affected not only social but industrial life. Labour papers began to be established. The Working Man's Advocate, published in New York City in 1825, was probably the very first American labour journal. Soon afterwards there appeared the Daily Sentinel and Young America, projected by two Englishmen, George Henry Evans and Frederick W. Evans. The chief demands advocated by these journals were the freedom of public lands, the breaking up of monopolies, the adoption of a general bankruptcy law, a lien for the labourer upon his work for his wages, the abolition of imprisonment for debt, equal rights for women with men, and the abolition of chattel and wage slavery. These demands were endorsed by over 600 newspapers. In 1830 a Working-man's Convention was held in Syracuse, New York, the outcome of which was the nomination of Ezekiel Williams for governor. In 1832 a delegated convention which met in the state house at Boston initiated the 10-hours movement. The Tribune (New York), under the leadership of Horace Greeley, was opened to the advocacy of Fourierism, and so on all hands the movement towards organization was helped. In 1845 the New England Working Man's Association was organized, and such men as Charles A. Dana, George Ripley, Albert Brisbane, Wendell Phillips, William Lloyd Garrison, Theodore Parker, and others participated in its meetings. The first industrial congress of the United States was convened in the city of New York on the 12th of October 1845, but little came of it. Other and more important labour congresses were held in that city and in Chicago in 1847 and 1850 respectively. During the latter part of the formative period, that is, from 1825 to 1860, most of the great national trade unions that are now influential were projected and organized, though their great and rapid growth has been since the Civil War. The National Typographical Union was organized in 1852, its name being changed to International in 1862 in order to admit Canadian members; the National Union of Hat Finishers in 1854; the Iron Moulders' Union of North America on the 5th of July 1859; and in the same year the Machinists' and Blacksmiths' Union of North America. By 1860 the national unions already formed numbered 26.
During the next few years, among other important organizations, were instituted what are known as the group of railway Railway Brotherhoods. brotherhoods, the oldest and largest of which is the International Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers. The grand division was founded at Detroit, Michigan, on the 17th of August 1863, under the name of the Brotherhood of the Footboard. The society was reorganized under its present title at Indianapolis, Ind., on the 17th of August 1864. The second national association of railway employés that was organized was the Conductors' Brotherhood, formed at Mendota, Illinois, on the 6th of July 1868, by the conductors from various railways in the United States. This brotherhood was recognized, and a general governing board established, on the 15th of December of the same year. Ten years later the name of the organization was changed from the Conductors' Brotherhood to the Order of Railroad Conductors of America. The Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen was organized at Port Jervis, N.Y., on the 1st of December 1873. The Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen was organized at Oneonta, N.Y., on the 23rd of September 1883. It was called the Brotherhood of Railroad Brakemen until the 1st of January 1890, when the present name was adopted. The Brotherhood of Railroad Trackmen is one of the younger and smaller organizations. The first efforts to found it were made in the spring of 1887, but its permanent organization took place a year later. The Brotherhood of Railroad Carmen of America was founded on the 9th of September 1890, by the consolidation of the Carmen's Mutual Aid Association, the Brotherhood of Railroad Car Repairers, the Car Inspectors, Repairers and Oilers' Protective Association and the Brotherhood of Railroad Carmen of Canada. The Switchmen's Union of North America is the outgrowth of the Switchmen's Mutual Aid Association, the present organization dating from 1897. Several of these railway brotherhoods suffered materially in their membership and influence through the organization of the American Railway Union in 1893.
The Cigar-Makers' National Union dates from 1864, the Bricklayers' and Masons' International Union from the 17th of
