independence and elected "labor" members of boards of aldermen, legislatures, and the federal Congress. It has attempted independent political parties only to merge, as a rule, with other parties as concessions were won or issues died out.

The significance of the labor movement is not exhausted by spectacular operations. Its steady and persistent work of organization, its moderate programs of legislative reform, its loyalty to thousands of contracts, its vast productiveness in industry are all likely to be forgotten in times of peace by the rank and file of the workers as well as by the public in general.

For this reason the professional classes and others outside of the labor movement usually fail to understand labor when crises are upon them. They are apt to look upon labor outbursts as sudden spells of madness and hysteria; they declare that labor has no policy, no knowledge of its goal, no informed leadership. That is why some historians treat the labor movement solely under such heads as the "Molly Maguires," the "Chicago Anarchists," and the "Criminal Alien," and let the case rest there, unable to realize that, if organized labor has been occasionally restive and troublesome to comfortable persons, it has also been one of the most conservative influences in American life. It is true that there is always a large group of extreme radicals in the labor world, but it is either on the outside of organized

labor or on the fringe of the movement, and is constantly subdued by the more conservative and official leaders in the movement. It is likewise true that there are Molly Maguires and Herr Mosts, speaking in the name of labor, but for every representative of this type there are a dozen men like John Mitchell, Samuel Gompers, and Matthew Woll. For every broken contract there are plenty of contracts faithfully fulfilled to the end.

The labor movement, however, is more than its leaders, its organization, and its strikes. It has a deep spiritual and social significance. It grows in strength day and night. It develops ideals of peace, harmony, and well-being in the industrial world as well as contest and destructiveness. The form of labor's organization and its program change from day to day, but its numerical strength increases and its growing solidarity gives more and more weight to its counsels. Indeed it takes on the form of a great social force akin to titanic forces in the natural world. For that reason, if for no other, it is better to study and understand it than blindly to praise it or rail at it.

CHAPTER II

ORIGIN OF AMERICAN TRADE UNIONS

Local labor organizations in colonial times.There were no trade unions in the modern sense in the American colonies under British dominion. There were labor organizations in the towns but they were friendly and benevolent societies formed by mechanics and journeymen. They were similar in spirit to those formed among master employers. Their main purpose was to take care of members in times of illness or financial distress. They were friendly societies in an age when public hospitals, homes for the aged, poor farms, pensions, and charitable institutions were not sustained on a large scale by public taxation. They were formed by the new town-dwellers-printers, shoemakers, smiths, and carpenters, who had been separated from the soil and therefore had no individual resources to fall back upon in an emergency. Just as members of the same church, race, or neighborhood drew together for mutual aid, so the mechanics drew together to help one another. As there were no banks or credit societies, these early trade societies kept chests for

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the deposit of money and, on occasion, loaned money to members in need. In addition to their benevolent features, they acted as censors of the quality of the work of their members and even censored morals as well as workmanship. When they were legally incorporated, it was with the express stipulation that they were not to interfere with wages, hours of labor, and similar economic matters. In short, they were not trade unions as we understand that term to-day. Independence opens a new era in industry and labor.-With American independence, an entirely new set of forces came into play. Great Britain had supervised and restricted American enterprise in the interest of the mother country. When her restraints were thrown off, Americans thought they could develop their own industries in their own way. They could trade with all countries of the world and thus widely extend their markets, increasing the demand for their goods. Great Britain, being anxious to retain industries for herself, had sought to keep the colonies agricultural in character. British control being broken, the Americans leaped with zeal into the industrial field. They had an abundance of natural resources of all kinds, and they no longer had an outside force to stay their hands.

The adoption of the Constitution marks a commercial revolution.-The period that followed independence (1776) was one of war and weakness, but when the new form of government was established in

1789, giving strength to the union of states and security to business, American enterprise was soon manifest. Under the Constitution, a national bank was founded to give a common medium of exchange throughout the country; uniform currency was introduced; treaties with foreign powers were negotiated; the tariffs which the states had formerly imposed on goods coming from other states were broken down. In a word, the American market was extended over the entire United States. Commercial warfare between the states was stopped. Finances were put on a sound basis. American credit abroad was established firmly and foreign capital to develop iron, steel, ship building and other industries was secured in abundance. With social order guaranteed, plenty of capital at hand, unlimited natural resources, a national market available, a world market opened, a generous supply of European labor assured through immigration, American business men could swing forward with their industries on a large scale.

The great market opened by the merchant capitalist. The great market was first opened by a peculiar type of business man, the merchant capitalist. He was not usually the owner of industries nor the employer of artisans, He was a trader and middle-man, mediating between the producer and the consumer. He specialized in buying and selling. His motto was: "Buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest market." He therefore bought up