Knights of Labor seal

The Knights of Labor, also known as Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor, was founded by seven Philadelp tailors in 1869, led by Uriah S. Stephens. It grew to be one of the most important American labor organizations of the 19th century. The Knights' ideology may be described as producerist, demanding an end to child and convict labor, equal pay for women, a progressive income tax, and the cooperative employer-employee ownership of mines and factories. Knights of Labor seal (large) This is a copyrighted and/or trademarked logo. ... Knights of Labor seal (large) This is a copyrighted and/or trademarked logo. ... Uriah Smith Stephens (1821 - 1882) was a U.S. labor leader. ... Grange poster depicting the independent, industrious farmer as the keystone figure in society. ... Child laborers coming out of a dye factory, Dhaka, Bangladesh Child labor is the employment of children under an age determined by law or custom. ... This does not cite any references or sources. ... Equal pay for women is an issue involving pay inequality between men and women. ... A progressive tax, or graduated tax, is a tax that is larger as a percentage of income for those with larger incomes. ... A worker cooperative is a cooperative owned and operated by its worker-owners. There are no outside, or consumer owners, in a workers cooperative - only the workers own shares of the business. ...

Origins

The Knights of Labor had a reputation for being all-inclusive. Women, blacks (after 1883), and employers were accepted as members. The Knights' leadership advocated the admission of blacks into local assemblies, but turned a blind eye to the segregation of assemblies in the South. Mary Harris Jones, known as Mother Jones, helped recruit thousands of women to the Knights of Labor. Bankers, doctors, lawyers, gamblers, stockholders, and liquor manufacturers were excluded because they were considered unproductive members of society. Asians were also excluded, and, in November 1885, a branch of the Knights in Tacoma, Washington worked to expel the city's Chinese, which amounted to nearly a tenth of the overall city population at the time. The Knights strongly supported the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the Contract Labor Law of 1885, as did many other labor groups. Segregation means separation. ... Mary Harris Jones (August 1, 1837 – November 30, 1930), better known as Mother Jones, was a prominent American labor and community organizer, and Wobbly. ... Nickname: Location of Tacoma in Pierce County and Washington State Coordinates: , Country United States of America State Washington County Pierce Government  - Mayor Bill Baarsma (D) Area  - City 62. ... The Chinese Exclusion Act may be: The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 passed in the United States in 1882 banning Chinese from entering American soil. ... Since 1869, industries of the United States had been advertising that there were great wages and jobs in America, causing a great immigration of people into the country. ...

The Knights of Labor grew rapidly after the collapse of the National Labor Union in 1873, and especially after the replacement of Uriah Stephens with Terence V. Powderly. As membership expanded, the Knights began to function more as a labor union, and less like a fraternal organization. Local assemblies began to emphasize not only cooperative enterprises, but to initiate strikes to win concessions from non-Knights employers. Powderly opposed strikes as a "relic of barbarism", but the size and the diversity of the Knights afforded local assemblies a great deal of autonomy. The National Labor Union was the first national labor federation in the United States. ... Terence Vincent Powderly (1849 - 1924) was born in Carbondale, Pennsylvania, the son of Irish immigrants. ...

The Knights found that secrecy interfered with the organization's public work and inhibited its response to critics. Carroll Wright, U.S. Commissioner of the Bureau of Labor, characterized the Knights of Labor as a "purely and deeply secret organization" that drew heavily on Freemasonry for its ideas and procedures.^{[citation needed]} In 1881, the Order's General Assembly agreed to make its name and objects public and to abolish its initiating oaths. Most rituals associated with the order continued, and the Knights entered its period of greatest growth. “Freemasons” redirects here. ...

Though initially suspect of the strike as a method to advance their goals, the Knights aided various strikes and boycotts. Arguably their greatest victory was in the Union Pacific Railroad strike in 1884. The Wabash Railroad strike in 1885 was also a significant success, as Powderly did not follow his usual practice and supported what became a crippling strike on Jay Gould's Wabash Line. Gould met with Powderly and agreed to call off his campaign against the Knights of Labor, which had caused the turmoil originally. These positive developments encouraged new membership, and by 1886, the Knights had over 700,000 members. Look up Boycott in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... The Union Pacific Railroad (AAR reporting marks UP) (NYSE: UNP), headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska, is the largest railroad network in the United States. ... Jay Gould (1836-1892) Jason Gould (May 27, 1836 – December 2, 1892) was an American financier. ...

The organization had a hard time dealing with this gigantic influx of members, who were on the whole itching for strikes.^{[citation needed]}

While the Knights were in no way involved, the Haymarket Riot nonetheless significantly tarnished their reputation. The Haymarket Riot on May 4, 1886 in Chicago is generally considered to have been an important influence on the origin of international May Day observances for workers. ...

The Order was brought to Australia around 1890. The Freedom Assembly, which operated in Sydney during the tumultuous period of 1891-93, had as members well known Australian labour movement people such as William Lane, Ernie Lane, WG Spence, Arthur Rae and George Black. A similar assembly operated in Melbourne. Ernie Lane was shot in her home and bled to death. This article is about the metropolitan area in Australia. ... Eight-hour day banner, Melbourne, 1856 University of Melbourne site where Stonemasons won the 8 hour day in 1856 The history of the Australian labour movement reaches back to the 19th century and the movement has a long tradition of organised unions of workers and links to political activity. ... William Lane (1861-1917) was a pioneer of the Australian labour movement. ...

In decline

There was widespread repression of labor unions in the late 1880s. In addition, the Knights were unsuccessful in the Missouri Pacific strike in 1886. The Great Southwest Railroad Strike of 1886 was a labor union strike against the Union Pacific and Missouri Pacific railroads involving more than 200,000 workers. ...

Violence against strikers, including the Haymarket Riot, and intensified disputes between the skilled trade unionists (also known as craft unionists) and the industrial unionists weakened the organization. The Haymarket Riot on May 4, 1886 in Chicago is generally considered to have been an important influence on the origin of international May Day observances for workers. ... by Leon CunninghamCraft unionism refers to an approach to union organizing in the United States and elsewhere that seeks to unify workers in a particular industry along the lines of the particular craft or trade that they work in. ... Industrial unionism is a labor union organizing method through which all workers in the same industry are organized into the same union — regardless of skill or trade — thus giving workers in one industry, or in all industries, more leverage in bargaining and in strike situations. ...

The Knights lost many craft unionists in 1886 when the rival American Federation of Labor was founded.^[1] The American Federation of Labor (AFL) was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States. ...

Membership declined with the additional problems of an autocratic structure, mismanagement, and further unsuccessful strikes. In 1890, it had fewer than 100,000 members. At the same time, the Knights received political support from the People's Party. Terence Powderly was replaced as Grand Master Workman by James Sovereign in 1893. Two years later, members of the Socialist Labor Party left the Knights to found the Socialist Trade & Labor Alliance as a Marxist rival. Membership was reduced to 17,000. The majority of New York City's District Assembly 49 joined the Industrial Workers of the World at its 1905 foundation. Although, by 1900, it was virtually nonexistent as a labor union, the Knights maintained a central office until 1917 and held conventions until 1932. At least a few local assemblies lasted until 1949.^[2] The Populist Party (also known as the Peoples Party) was a short-lived political party in the United States in the late 19th century. ... The Socialist Labor Party of America (SLP) is the oldest socialist political party in the United States and the second oldest socialist party in the world. ... The Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance - often abbreviated STLA or ST&LA - was a revolutionary socialist labor union in the United States closely linked to the Socialist Labor Party (SLP), which existed from 1895 until becoming a part of the Industrial Workers of the World at its founding in 1905. ... Marxism is the political practice and social theory based on the works of Karl Marx, a 19th century philosopher, economist, journalist, and revolutionary, along with Friedrich Engels. ... The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW or the Wobblies) is an international union currently headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. At its peak in 1923 the organization claimed some 100,000 members in good standing, and could marshal the support of perhaps 300,000 workers. ...

Leaders

• Uriah S. Stephens led 1869 - 1879
• Terence V. Powderly led 1879 - 1893
• James Soveriegn led 1893 - ??
• James W. Hayes led ?? - 1917

Uriah Smith Stephens (1821 - 1882) was a U.S. labor leader. ... Terence Vincent Powderly (1849 - 1924) was born in Carbondale, Pennsylvania, the son of Irish immigrants. ...

See also

Organized Labour Portal

• Labor unions in the United States
• List of trade unions
• Labor federation competition in the U.S.

Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Labor unions in the United States today function as legally recognized representatives of workers in numerous industries, but are strongest among public sector employees such as teachers and police. ... This is a list of trade unions and union federations by country. ... A labor federation is a group of unions or labor organizations that are in some sense coordinated. ...

Further reading

Books

• Browne, Henry J (1949). The Catholic Church and the Knights of Labor. Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 435. 
• Commons, John R. (1918). History of Labour in the United States - Vol. 2 1860-1896. 
• Fink, Leon (1983). Workingmen's Democracy: The Knights of Labor and American Politics. Urbana: University of Illois Press, 249. ISBN 56b11253. 
• Foner, Philip S. History of the Labor Movement in the United States. Vol. 2: From the Founding of the American Federation of Labor to the Emergence of American Imperialism. New York: International Publishers, 1955. Cloth ISBN 0-7178-0092-X; Paperback ISBN 0-7178-0388-0
• Garlock, Jonathan (c.1982). Guide to the local assemblies of the Knights of Labor. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. 
• Kealey, Gregory (1982). Dreaming of What Might Be: The Knights of Labor in Ontario, 1880-1900. New York: Cambridge University Press, 487. ISBN:. 
• Leikin, Steve (2005). The Practical Utopians: American Workers and the Cooperative Movement in the Guilded Age. 
• Levine, Susan (1984). Labor's True Women: Carpet Weavers, Industrialization, and Labor Reform in the Gilded Age. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 191. ISBN:. 
• McLaurin, Melton Alonza (1978). The Knights of Labor in the South.. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 0-313-20033-5. 
• Voss, Kim (1993). The Making of American Exceptionalism: The Knights of Labor and Class Formation in the Nineteenth Century. 
• Ware, Norman J. (1929). The Labor Movement in the United States, 1860 - 1895: A Study In Democracy. New York: D. Appelton and Company, 409. 
• Watillon, Leon (1978). The Knights of Labor in Belgium. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN:. 

John Rogers Commons (1862–1945) was a well-known institutional economist at the University of Wisconsin. ... Leon Fink (January 9, 1948) is a Distinguished Professor in the Department of History at the University of Illinois at Chicago. ... Kim Voss is a professor of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley whose main field of research is social movements and the American labor movement. ...

Articles

• Birdsall, William C. (July 1953). "The Problem of Structure in the Knights of Labor". Industrial and Labor Relations Review 6 (4): 532-546. DOI:10.2307/2518795. 
• Cassity, Michael J. (June 1979). "Modernization and Social Crisis: The Knights of Labor and a Midwest Community, 1885-1886". Journal of American History 66 (1): 41-61. DOI:10.2307/1894673. 
• Foner, Phillip S.; W. H. Sims, George H. Williams, Andrew McCormack, C. C. Mehurin, M. I. Mattox, B W Scott (January 1968). "The Knights of Labor". Journal of Negro History 53 (1): 70-77. DOI:10.2307/2716391. 
• Grobb, Gerald (Spring 1960). "Organized labor and the Negro Worker". Labor History 1: 166. 
• Hild, Matthew (Fall 2001). "Dixie Knights Redux: The Knights of Labor in Alabama, 1898-1902". Gulf South Historical Review 17 (1). 
• Kessler, Sidney H. (July 1937). "The Organization of Negroes in the Knights of Labor". Journal of Negro History 37: 255. DOI:doi:10.2307/2715493. 
• Kemmerer, Donald L. (January 1950). "Reasons for the Growth of the Knights of Labor in 1885-1886". Industrial and Labor Relations Review 3 (2): 213-220. DOI:10.2307/2518830. 
• Kittell, Allan H. (December 1960). "Review: The Knights of Labor in Belgium by Leon Watillon, Frederic Meyers". Journal of Modern History 32 (4): 400. DOI:10.2307/2518830. 
• Licht, Walter (Summer 1985). "The Knights of Labor Commemorated and Reconsidered: : Dreaming of What Might Be: The Knights of Labor in Ontario, 1880-1900; Workingmen's Democracy: The Knights of Labor and American Politics". Journal of Interdisciplinary History 16 (1): 117-123. DOI:10.2307/204327. 
• Miner, Claudia (2nd Quarter, 1983). "The 1886 Convention of the Knights of Labor". Pylon 44 (2): 147-159. DOI:10.2307/275026. 
• Pelling, Henry (1956). "The Knights of Labor in Britain, 1880-1901". Economic History Review 9 (new series) (2): 313-331. DOI:10.2307/2591749. 
• Wheeler, Hoyt N (Fall 2004). ""Producers of the World Unite! A Return of Reformist Unionism?"". Labor Studies Journal 29: 81-100. 

A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... Philip S. Foner (December 14, 1910 - December 13, 1994) was a United States historian and author. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ...

Contemporary accounts by Knights

• Knights of Labor (1887 - 1913). Proceedings of the General Assembly, 10th - 30th (microfilm), Library of American civilization. LAC 23217-20. 
• Knights of Labor (1878 - 1886). Record of the proceedings of the General Assembly, 1st - 9th (microfilm), Library of American civilization. LAC 23214-16. 
• Powderly, Terence Vincent (1889). Thirty Years of Labor. 1859-1889. Excelsior publishing house, 693. 
• Powderly, Terence Vincent (1889). Thirty Years of Labor. 1859-1889. Excelsior publishing house, 693. 
• Powderly, Terence Vincent; Edmund Janes James (1891). The Labor Movement: The Problem of To-day. The M. W. Hazen Company, 628. 
  • Powderly, Terence Vincent (1891). The Labor Movement: The Problem of To-day; Chapter XV: The History of the Knights of Labor, 397 - 428. 
• Powderly, Terence Vincent (1891). in John A. Turcheneske, Jr: Terence Vincent Powderly Papers 1864-1937 and John Williams Hayes Papers 1880-1921, The Knights of Labor, 109 reels. 

Contemporary accounts by others

• Davitt, Michael (October 1890). "Labor Tendencies in Great Britain". The North American review 151: 453-469. 
• Dunham, A. C. (June 1886). "The Knights of Labor". New Englander and Yale review 45: 490-498. 
• Durham, John Stephens (February 1898). "The Labor Unions and the Negro". The Atlantic monthly 81: 222-231. 
• George, Henry (July 1887). "The New Party". The North American review 145: 1-8. 
• Hatch, Rufus (June 1884). "The Labor Crisis". The North American review 142: 602-607. 
• Hinton, Richard J. (January 1885). "American Labor Organizations". The North American review 140: 48-63. 
• Kelley, M. E. J. (April 1898). "Women and the Labor Movement". The North American review 166: 408-418. 
• Parsons, George Frederic (July 1886). "The Labor Question". The Atlantic monthly 58: 97-113. 
• Wright, Carroll D. (January 1887). "An Historical Sketch of the Knights of Labor". Quarterly Journal of Economics 1: 137-168. DOI:10.2307/1880768. 

Michael Davitt c. ... Henry George Henry George (September 2, 1839 – October 29, 1897) was an American political economist and the most influential proponent of the Single Tax on land. ... A prolific shipbuilder in Bursledon, Hampshire for the Royal Navy between 1780 and his death in 1812. ... Carroll Davidson Wright (1840-1909), American statistician, was born at Dunbarton, New Hampshire, on the 25th of July 1840. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a standard for persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related data, the metadata, in a structured extensible way. ...

References

External links

• Freemasonry: Unions - Mutual Aid Through Collective Bargaining. History of Labor Unions in Marin County. Mill Valley Lodge #356, Mill Valley, California, USA. Retrieved on 2006-10-08.
• Select Bibliography of Terence V. Powderly and the Knights of Labor. Catholic University of America. Retrieved on 2006-10-08.