Week 2: The Industrial Working Class and the Knights of Labor

Assignments

In-class participation.
Paper 1 Draft 1 – due week 4.

Class Agenda

The industrial working class in the late 1800s.
1877: The Grand Army of Starvation – film, q&a worksheet, and discussion.
Research paper structure.
Writing surveys.
The Knights of Labor.

Industrialization and the Growth of the Working Class

Industrialization in the 1860s-1890s witnessed major economic transformations, and the growth of large corporations like the railroads.
The U.S. economy was largely unregulated and profoundly unstable with boom-and-bust cycles.
The overextension of leading railroad creditor Jay Cooke precipitated the financial Panic of 1873, which lasted for five years with massive unemployment, underemployment, and lower earnings for workers.
The growth of industrialization also profoundly changed the work people did.

Changes in Work and Life

In 1860, half of workers were self-employed, and the other half depended on wages from an employer. By 1900, two-thirds depended on wages.
Coal and steam power allowed for industries to concentrate in large cities, where they had better access to railroads, shipping routes, and consumer markets. The urban working-class population grew rapidly from 1860 to 1900.
Industrial job growth drew people to the U.S. Ten million immigrants arrived in the U.S. between 1860 and 1890 (with 5.25 million arriving in the 1880s).

The Industrial Working Class

How was the industrial working class divided by race, ethnicity, gender, age, and skill?
Given these divisions, what if anything did working-class people have in common?

The Industrial Working Class: Examples of Ethnic Division

German men: brewers, bakers, and furniture makers.
Irish men: laborers, plumbers, carpenters, and bricklayers.
English, Welsh, and Scots men: machinists, metal workers, and miners.
Examples of division by gender, race, age, and skill:
New immigrants, African Americans, poor women, and children: service jobs, domestic jobs, and low-paid industrial jobs.

The Industrial Working Class: Income Inequality

Men were often paid 50% more than women (women shut out of many jobs done by men or paid less to do the same jobs)
White workers were paid much more than African American, Mexican American, and Chinese Americans
Skilled workers were often paid more than double than semi-skilled workers.
Locomotive engineer annual earnings in 1880: $800$
Textile mill worker annual earnings in 1880: $350$

Working Class Commonalities Across Divisions

60 hour+ workweeks
Growing concentration of workers in large factories
Little job security
Pay cuts
Being forced to buy tools to complete the job
Price gouging in company stores and housing
Few labor protections
Had to deal with “Social Darwinism”

The Labor Question

Could Democracy Survive in Industrial America?

1877: The Grand Army of Starvation

As the Panic of 1873 entered its fourth year, social unrest grew…

The Structure of Research Papers

An introduction that sets the historical context of the paper ending with a…
…thesis statement that makes arguments and addresses the questions of the assignment.
Topic-based supporting paragraphs:
Each supporting paragraph should have a topic sentence.
Each supporting paragraph should be based on one main topic (an event, a person, or a significant historical development).
Major topics can be covered in more than one paragraph.
Evidence and source citations:
Your supporting paragraphs should summarize and analyze evidence from course readings and videos.
You should use direct quotes to illustrate major examples, but not overuse them.
All evidence, whether directly quoted or summarized, needs source citations.
A conclusion that readdresses your thesis, ties together your topics, argues for the overall historical significance, and/or makes connections between the past and present. Your conclusion should do some of these things, but not necessarily all of them.

The Knights of Labor

“Individually, workingmen are weak, and, when separated, each one follows a different course, without accomplishing anything for himself or his fellow man; but when combined in one common bond of brotherhood, they become as the cable, each strand of which, though weak and insignificant enough in itself, is assisted and strengthened by being joined with others, and the work that one could not perform alone is easily accomplished by a combination of strands.” - Terence Powderly, Grand Master Workman, Knights of Labor

The Knights of Labor: Origins and Growth

The Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor was founded in Philadelphia in 1869 as a secret society to protect its members from employer blacklists.
Under the leadership of Terence Powderly, the Knights abandoned their secrecy and grew massively in the 1870s and 1880s.
Unlike craft unions, the Knights sought to unite workers across skill, ethnic, racial, and (eventually) gender lines, adopting the motto “an injury to one is the concern of all.”

Republicanism and Producerism

The Knights of Labor linked republicanism (government determined by the people) and producerism (production determined by the workers).
Both ideologies had deep roots going back centuries.
They believed that workers, farmers, and honest manufacturers (those that produced useful goods and services) could save America from corporate domination.
The Knights excluded “non-producers:” bankers, speculators, lawyers, and liquor dealers.

Highlights from the Declaration of Principles

“To make industrial and moral worth, not wealth, the true standard of individual and National greatness.”
“To secure to the workers the full enjoyment of the wealth they create, sufficient leisure in which to develop their intellectual, moral, and social faculties…”
“That the public lands, the heritage of the people, be reserved for actual settlers; not another acre for railroads or speculators…”
“The adoption of measures providing for the health and safety for those engaged in mining and manufacturing, building industries, and for indemnification for those engaged therein for injuries received through lack of necessary safeguards.”
“The recognition, by incorporation, of trades’ unions, orders, and such other associations as may be organized for the working masses to improve their condition and protect their rights.”

Highlights from the Declaration of Principles (cont.)

“The enactment of laws to compel corporations to pay their workers weekly, in lawful money, for the labor of the preceding week…”
“That the government shall obtain possession, under the right of eminent domain, of all telegraphs, telephones, and railroads…”
“To establish co-operative institutions such as will tend to supersede the wage system, by the introduction of a co-operative industrial system.”
“To secure for both sexes equal pay for equal work.”
“To shorten the hours of labor by a general refusal to work for more than eight hours.”

“A Union For All”

The Knights of Labor was genuinely more egalitarian than most of the unions that preceded it and many that came after it.
It welcomed African American workers, welcomed unskilled workers, welcomed most immigrant workers, eventually welcomed women workers, and even welcomed “fair minded” employers.
Though Powderly did not favor strikes, many Knights assemblies held successful strikes anyway.

Internal Issues and Contradictions

While the Knights welcomed African American members, most local assemblies remained segregated.
Despite welcoming most immigrants, the Knights shunned Chinese workers and argued in favor of the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act.
The Knights waffled on equal pay for women and were at first resistant to women’s membership. Terence Powderly finally agreed to allow women members after Mary Stirling of the Philadelphia “lady shoemakers” protested at the 1881 convention.

What Was At Stake?

The Knights of Labor had between $700,000$ and $1,000,000$ members by 1886 in 15,000 local assemblies.
Despite its internal issues and contradictions, the massive growth of the Knights of Labor, including its popularity among African American and immigrant workers, sparked widespread fear among employers. Louisiana Sugar Cane Workers, ca. 1880