Page 473 - Encyclopedia of Business and Finance
P. 473
eobf_L 7/5/06 3:14 PM Page 450
Labor Unions
Officials from the National Labor Relations Board watch as workers at the Jones and Laughlin steel mill vote whether the Steel
Workers Organizing Committee will be their sole bargaining agency May 20, 1937. © BETTMANN/CORBIS
national federation both craft unions and reform groups. This second group merged with a group of individual
The Noble Order of the Knights of Labor, founded in craft unions in 1886 to become the American Federation
1869, sought to unite all workers, both skilled and of Labor (AFL). This was the beginning of modern union
unskilled. In 1886, when its membership had reached structure. The AFL’s first president, Samuel Gompers
more than 700,000, it split into two groups. The revolu- (1850–1924), kept the improvement of wages, hours, and
tionary socialist group wanted the government to take working conditions as the objectives of the union. AFL
over production; the traditional group wanted to remain membership grew rapidly until the 1920s, when there
focused on the economic well-being of its members. were few skilled craftworkers yet to be organized. By that
450 ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BUSINESS AND FINANCE, SECOND EDITION