Timeline
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EVENTS IN U.S. LABOR HISTORY (1800-1989)
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1835 Children employed at the silk mills in Patterson, New Jersey went on strike for the 11 hour day/6 day week; Geneva shoemakers are tried and convicted for conspiracy. The first federal government employee work stoppage begins when employees at the Washington and Philadelphia Navy yards struck for the 10-hour day and for general redress of their grievances.
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1842 In Commonwealth v. Hunt, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that labor unions, as such, are not illegal conspiracies; Connecticut and Massachusetts passed laws prohibiting children from working over ten hours per day.
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1860 Shoemakers successfully strike in Lynn, Massachusetts/New England (800 women operatives and 4,000 workmen marched during the strike). Abraham Lincoln, in support of the shoemakers, says, "Thank God that we have a system of labor where there can be a strike."
- 1864 The legality of importing immigrants by holding a portion of their wages or property is upheld in the Contract Labor Law. These immigrants were often used as strikebreakers. Though this law was repealed in 1868, the practice was not outlawed until the passage of the Foran Act in 1885.
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1868 First federal 8 hour day passed, only applies to laborers, mechanics, and workmen employed by the government.
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1869 In Washington DC, the Black National Labor Union was founded under the leadership of Isaak Myers; the first local of the Knights of Labor was founded in Philadelphia--it maintained extreme secrecy. Membership was open to blacks and women; the first national female union (Daughters of St. Crispin) was organized. They held a convention in Lynn, Massachusetts and elected Carrie Wilson as president.
- 1870 The first written contract between coal miners and coal mine operators was signed; Due to overcrowding and unsanitary conditions, infant mortality in New York was 65% higher than in 1810.
- 1873 The "Panic of 1873" followed by a depression wiped out most national unions.
- 1874 The original Tompkins Square Riot occured. As unemployed workers demonstrated in NY's Tompkins Square Park, a detachment of mounted police charged into the crowd, beating men, women and children indiscriminately with billy clubs and leaving hundreds of casualties in their wake. Police Commissioner, Abram Duryee, comments: "It was the most glorious sight I ever saw..." Also, in New York City, police injured dozens of unemployed at a rally.
- 1877 On June 21st, ten coal-mining activists ("Molly Maguires") were hanged in Pennsylvania. On July 14th, a National railroad strike crippled the country. Federal troops were called out to force an end to the nationwide strike as some state militias sided with strikers. At the "Battle of the Viaduct" in Chicago, federal troops (recently returned from an Indian massacre) killed 30 workers and wounded over 100.
- 1882 The First Labor Day celebration was held in New York City where some 30,000 workers marched in the parade.
- 1884 The Federal Bureau of Labor was established as part of Department of the Interior.
- 1885 The Foran Act was passed which outlaws immigration of laborers on contract.
- 1885 This year marked the period of greatest influence by Knights of Labor.
- 1886 In Columbus, Ohio, the American Federation of Labor is formed with Samuel Gompers as the first president. Hundreds of thousands of American workers took their protests to the streets to demand the universal adoption of the eight hour day. Chicago was the center of the movement bringing most of Chicago manufacturing to a standstill. A fight involving hundreds broke out at McCormick Reaper between locked-out unionists and the non-unionist workers McCormick hired to replace them. The Chicago Police, swollen in number and heavily armed, quickly moved in with clubs and guns to restore order. They left four unionists dead and many others wounded. Then at Haymarket Square in Chicago during a rally in support of the 8 hour day, violence erupted following a mysterious explosion which killed seven policemen and injured 67 others. Hysterical city and state government officials rounded up eight anarchists, tried them for murder, and sentenced them to death.
- 1887 On November 11th, four of the 8 anarchists accused in the Haymarket Square explosion, including Parsons and Spies, were executed. All of the men executed advocated armed struggle and violence as revolutionary methods, but their prosecutors found no evidence that any had actually thrown the Haymarket bomb. They died for their words, not their deeds. A quarter of a million people lined Chicago's street during Parson's funeral procession to express their outrage at this gross miscarriage of justice. For radicals and trade unionists everywhere, Haymarket became a symbol of the stark inequality and injustice of the dominant society. The Bayview Massacre also took place at this time, where 7 people, including 1 child, were killed by the state militia. The Milwaukee Journal reported that 8 more would die within 24 hours and without hesitation added that Governor Rusk was to be commended for his quick action in the matter. Also in this year, the Louisiana Militia, aided by bands of "prominent citizens," shot 35 unarmed black sugar workers striking to gain a dollar-per-day wage and lynched two strike leaders.
- 1892 The Homestead Strike in Pennsylvania occured where Pinkerton guards, trying to pave the way for the introduction of scabs, opened fire on striking Carnegie mill steel workers. Three Pinkertons surrendered, then unarmed, a mob of townspeople, most of them women, set upon them and beat them. Seven guards and 11 strikers and spectators were shot to death. The Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel, and Tin Workers lost the fight over Carnegie Steel's attempt to break the union. Striking miners in Coeur D'Alene, Idaho dynamited the Frisco Mill, leaving it in ruins.
- 1893 The first of several bloody mining strikes occured at Cripple Creek, Colorado. During a strike against the Pullman Palace Car Company, which had drastically reduced wages, the 1892 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago's Jackson Park was set ablaze, and seven buildings were reduced to ashes. The mobs raged on, burning and looting railroad cars and fighting police in the streets until July 10th when 14,000 federal and state troops finally succeeded in putting down the strike.
- 1894 Strike by the American Railway Union against the Pullman Palace Car Company near Chicago was defeated by the use of injunctions and federal troops. Federal troops killed 34 American Railway Union members in the Chicago area attempting to break a strike led by Eugene Debs, against the Pullman Company. Debs and several others were imprisoned for violating injunctions, causing disintegration of the union.
- 1896 On September 21st, the state militia was sent to Leadville, Colorado to break a miner's strike.
- 1897 On September 10th, 19 unarmed striking coal miners and mine workers were killed and 36 wounded by a posse organized by the Luzerne County sheriff for refusing to disperse near Lattimer, Pennsylvania. The strikers, most of whom were shot in the back, were originally brought in as strike-breakers, but later organized themselves.
- 1898 A portion of the Erdman Act, which would have made it a criminal offense for railroads to dismiss employees or discriminate against prospective employees based on their union activities, was declared invalid by the U.S. Supreme Court. On October 12th, 14 were killed and 25 wounded in violence resulting when Virden, Illinois mine owners attempted to break a strike by importing 200 non-union black workers.
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