The Knights saw Asian immigrants as competition that employers would use to keep down their wages. ![]() Attacks on Chinese Workersīut not every position that the organization took was progressive. The Knights also opened up their organization to Black workers, and Black people eventually formed the majority of Knights membership in the South, according to Charles Postel’s book Equality: An American Dilemma, 1866-1896. They also advocated nationalization of the railroads and telephone networks, and a graduated federal income tax (similar to the one eventually established in 1913).Įven more radically, the Knights supported cooperatively-run workshops-a forerunner of today’s employee-owned companies-as well as cooperative stores. The Knights also advocated an end to child and convict labor, equal pay for women, and laws requiring that employers participate in arbitration to resolve differences with workers. Ending Child Labor and Lobbying for a Graduated Income Tax The organization championed broad-ranging social and economic reform, including an eight-hour workday, health and safety laws to protect workers, and a system that would provide for them if they were injured on the job-an early version of workers compensation insurance. Shortly afterward, the Knights waged even bigger successful strikes in 1884-85 against the Wabash Railroad and Southwest railroad system controlled by financier Jay Gould.īut it wasn’t just better wages that the Knights campaigned for. When the railroad tried the same move three months later, the Knights launched another strike and forced the company to concede defeat in just five days and restore workers’ pay. Led by organizer Joseph Buchanan, the Knights shut down every railroad shop from Omaha Nebraska to Ogden, Utah, as well as all the branch lines.Īs Matthew Hild recounts in Greenbackers, Knights of Labor and Populists, it only took four days for the railroad bosses to rescind the pay reduction. In 1884, when the Union Pacific Railroad cut workers’ wages by 10 percent, the Knights quickly organized a strike. At the apex of their power, the Knights achieved some major successes. Joseph Buchanan Leads Strikes Against Railroad CompaniesĪt the height of the Knights’ influence in the mid-1880s, the organization claimed a membership of 700,000. At the time it was seen as a radical stance. Under Powderly’s leadership, in 1881 the Knights declared that women would be accepted as members and have equal rights in the organization as men did. Powderly, a machinist of Catholic Irish ancestry from Carbondale, Pennsylvania, was elected to take his place. In 1879, Stephens stepped down, and Terrence V. The only occupations they excluded were bankers, lawyers, gamblers and saloon keepers. Over the decade that followed, though, the Knights expanded across the nation, attracting a range of workers in different industries, from blacksmiths and boilermakers to bricklayers and carpet weavers. Knights of Labor Expands Under Terrence Powderly Stephens explained to them his vision for an organization, “The Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor,” whose members would be sworn to secrecy, and follow rituals comparable to Masonry. He called a meeting at his home, and six garment cutters showed up. ![]() When the local garment cutters union disbanded after failing to get better wages from local clothing companies, Stephens saw his chance. Instead, all wage-earners had to be brought together into a single organization, which could then fight for the interests of them all. It wasn’t just enough for a group of workers at one company to strike for higher wages, he believed. ![]() Stephens’ experiences as a worker-led him to believe that massive changes in society were necessary. ![]() When Stephens’ family lost everything during the economic panic and depression of the late 1830s, he became an indentured worker, obligated to work without pay in exchange for being trained as an apprentice mechanic. Stephens, a descendant of early Quaker settlers in New Jersey, founded the Knights of Labor on Thanksgiving Day 1869 in Philadelphia.
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