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1869 - Knights of Labor

The Knights of Labor organized on a principle widely at variance with that underlying the organization of the trades unions and the American Federation of Labor. The basis of the organization of the Knights of Labor ignored vocation and sought the unification of all individual or separate interests in the interests of the whole.

The Order of the Knights of Labor was an organization originally quite different from the American Federation of Labor, in organic structure as well as in underlying principle. It was founded by a set of men who, however deficient in understanding of the social fabric according to later day standards, had a purpose higher and purer than the AFL ever laid claim to. They really wanted to organize the working class as against the capitalist class, not only the skilled crafts but all of the working class, skilled and unskilled, with a decided tendency to go after the unskilled first on the theory that they needed organization most.

The conglomeration of unions that formed the National Labor Union and the 15,000 assemblies of the Knights of Labor responded to the onslaught of industrialism after the Civil War by searching for ways to reestablish the community of interest that was threatened by a new and rapidly spreading organization of work. In the view of the Knights, the successful operation of a democratic republic based on the full participation of all of its citizens required a recognition of the "dignity," "autonomy," or "independence" of the working person. That meant fighting for workplace conditions that respected the capacities of all toilers and permitted their moral and intellectual development. At bottom, the Knights believed that only the elimination of the wage system could guarantee such respect and ensure that manhood was equated with citizenship and some possibility for exercising it. In practice, protecting the dignity of the individual required what has come to be known as social unionism: collective activity in the community, the workplace, and above all in the political arena. Individual dignity was not the end product; it was the means for assuring social harmony. There existed in the Order a distinct revulsion against the craft union spirit and, in a crude and groping way, they had hold of the germ of the idea of industrial unionism, as far as that was possible in those days. A healthy class instinct animated them and, to paraphrase a familiar saying, "They were on the way, though they didn't know where to go."

This was an exceedingly broad basis, and follows the attempt of the International [the First International], organized in London in the autumn of 1864, to associate workingmen wherever manufacturing had gained any foothold. The International had some standing in the United States. Its broad foundation had an influence in such future organizations, but its practices were not American, and the attempt of organized labor on its broad basis practically failed. But the second great attempt to utilize the society basis for the basis of labor organization resulted in the Noble Order of Knights of Labor.

The order of the Knights of Labor was first organized as a local secret society in Philadelphia in 1869 by ten garment cutters. They had reviously been organized as a trade-union, but issolved this union and organized the new society mainly under the lead of Uriah S. Stephens, one of their number. The names of the others were James L. Wright, Robert C. Macauley, Joseph S. Kennedy, William Cook, Robert, David Westcott, W. H. Phillips, Washington Shields, etc. On Dec. 30th the new society declared itself Local Assembly No. 1 of the Knights of Labor. Mr. Stephens was elected Master Workman. They decided to admit to their number working men, no matter of what occupation.

They grew slowly; but a second assembly was not organized till 1872. During that year, however, twenty-seven assemblies were organized in Philadel hia. The first assembly organized outside of P iladel hia was an assembly of gold-beaters in New ork City. Christmas Day, 1873, the first district assembly was formed. A general assembly was not formed till 1878, at Reading, Pa., when Mr. Stephens was chosen Grand Master Workman. Up to this time the order had elicited little general notice; it was strictlg secret, with ritual and educational work in the principles of the labor movement.

Their declaration of rinciples was adopted at this assembly, having been written in substance by G.E. McNeill for a labor congress at ochester in 1874. It became from this time the principles of the order. Their aims included the recognition, by incorporation, of orders and other associations organized by the workers to improve their condition and to protect their rights, and the enactment of laws to compel corporations to pay their employees weekly. in lawful money, for the labor of the preceding week, and giving mechanics and laborers a first lien upon the product of their labor to the extent of their full wages; to secure for both sexes equal rights; to gain some of the benefits of labor-saving machinery by a gradual reduction of the hours of labor to eight hour day.

Strict secrecy was abolished at Detroit in 1881, and the name and objects of the order made public. There were at one time 700 local assemblies with some 500,000 members. Each year saw new growth. In the winter of 1885-86 there seemed to be a rush into organization. The railroad strikes in the Southwest and the excitement over the so-called Chicago anarchists turned the attention of working men everywhere to labor organization. At the General Assembly of 1886 delegates were present representing 800,000 members, and it was claimed that the total membership was over 1,000,000 in about 275 district assemblies, 23 state assemblies and over 1,300 local assemblies.

The growth was too fast. Men, without understanding the principles of the order, voted rash strikes. The general executive committee undertook too centralized an authority, massing men of various callings into the same assembly, and failing sufliciently to respect the autonomy of the different trades.

An opposition to this policy sprang up, eventuating ultimately in a split which culminated at the General Assembly of 1886, and resulted in the formation of the American Federation of Labor, which did recognize the autonomy of each craft, and only federated the organizations of the various crafts into one general federation for general purposes. Since then the Knights of Labor went down and the Federation has grown. The order, however, was still for many years very powerful.

Two new orders arose from dissensions among the Knights. The American Railway Union, organized in Chicago in 1893 by Eugene V. Debs, attempted to unite all railway employees in one organization, and became well known by winning a strike on the Great Northern Railroad in the winter of 1893-94, and still more by its conduct of the great Pullman strike of 1894.