more individualistic and opportunist. Although there are Socialist factions, and some leaders favour industrial unionism, the majority of organized labour clings to the tactics of federated crafts, and does not aim further than to increase wages, decrease hours and improve the conditions of employment through agreement with the employer. The American labour movement has not been led by “intellectuals.” The leaders have come from the ranks—one explanation of the characteristic opportunism and lack of a social philosophy. The great majority of American working men do not want a Labour party in politics; they do not consider themselves a separate class in the body politic. The American political parties antedate the formation of modern economic classes. Class parties are discountenanced as “un-American.” A politician in any party may present himself as a “friend of labour.” Moreover, the system of checks and balances of the Government offers resistance to change, and the division of sovereignty between state and Federal Government makes legislative reform measures difficult of passage. More can be accomplished with equal effort by trade-union methods. What part the American Federation of Labor has taken in politics has been to advise the working men to reward their friends and punish their enemies at the polls.
During the World War an attempt was made, without success, by the machinists of Connecticut to form a Labor party. In Nov. 1918 leaders of the Chicago Federation of Labor proposed a Labor party, and suggested 14 planks for the platform, which ranged from the right of labour to organize and bargain collectively to representation of labour as such in all Government departments. Eleven of the planks closely resembled the reconstruction programme of the American Federation of Labor. In Jan. 1919 the Labor party of Cook county (Chicago) was formed, with an official organ The New Majority. In April an Illinois state Labor party was formed at the convention of the state Federation of Labor. It elected several mayors and other officials. The same year there sprang up also a Pennsylvania state Labor party, the American Labor party of Greater New York and the Working People's Non-Partisan Political League of Minnesota, which last had the object of coöperating with the farmers' Non-Partisan League. In Nov. a national Farmer-Labor party was organized in Chicago, which aimed to draw together the working man and the farmer. This party nominated a president for the national election; 272,514 votes were polled for him, or 1% of the total votes cast. Other political parties, having as their aim better conditions of labour, are the Socialist party, the Communist party and the Communist Labor party, both of which latter split off from the Socialist party in Aug. 1919, and the Socialist Labor party (organs, The Socialist, the Weekly People). In the spring of 1920 the Michigan branch of the Communist party became the Proletarian party.
Labour and the World War.—In 1916 when President Wilson established the Council of National Defense he appointed Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, one of the seven members composing the advisory commission, to be in charge of all policies affecting labour. As chairman of a labour committee Gompers appointed about 350 persons, representatives of capital and labour, Government officials and others with technical qualifications, who effected a permanent organization as the full Committee on Labor of the Council of National Defense, April 2 1917. This committee early urged that legislation protecting labourers be not weakened during the war. Such was the sentiment also of labour organizations and civic associations generally. When, in the early spring of 1917, it appeared that the United States would enter the war, Gompers called a conference of the Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor with the presidents of international and national unions, heads of industrial departments and representatives of the railway brotherhoods. Those present at this conference, March 12, offered their services to the country in the event of war, and issued a call to members of their organizations to follow this lead. In order to secure the constant support of the Government by American wage-earners, the conference urged the adoption of trade-union standards for all war work, equal pay for equal work regardless of sex, the representation of organized labour on all committees which fixed policies for war work, and provision that special exertion of workers in war emergencies should not benefit chiefly the employers by increased profits. On April 17, at a meeting of the Council of National Defense and its Advisory Committee, Gompers gave his pledge that organized labour would support the Government to win the war. In the summer of 1917 the American Alliance for Labor and Democracy was formed by trade unionists, social reformers and non-pacifist socialists to counteract the pacifist propaganda of the People's Council of America. But some members of the trade unions opposed the pro-war stand of the leaders, and formed the Workmen's Council for Maintenance of Labor's Rights; this died out during the next year.
In Nov. the national convention of the American Federation of Labor passed a resolution that the United States was in the war for democracy against autocracy. The convention urged that organized labour be represented at the Peace Conference; that there be no reprisals against conquered nations; the independence of all nationalities; a league of free nations to maintain peace; certain labour standards to be accepted by international agreement as a part of the Peace Treaty and a plan for controlling employment during demobilization. In Feb. 1918 the Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor issued a statement that “this is labor's war.”
Early in 1918 the War Labor Policies Board was created, to administer the relations with labour of the Federal Government in its capacity as employer. It aimed to secure uniformity of conditions in all Government work and to stabilize the working force. It took a stand for prohibition of child labour and prison labour, in favour of the right of labourers to organize, a living wage, equal pay for equal work, the basic eight-hour day, and some definite system of settling labour disputes. To meet the grievances of employees on Government work, the National War Labor Board was established in April 1918 to serve as a final court of voluntary arbitration. The American Federation of Labor was given representation on the Emergency Construction Board, on the Fuel Administration Board (the president of the United Mine Workers was assistant to the Fuel Administrator), on the Woman's Board, on the Food Administration Board, and on the War Industries Board. In connexion with the administration of the Military Conscription Law organized labour was given representation on each District Exemption Board. Trade unionists were sent to Russia on the Commission of Investigation in the spring of 1917.
The Mooney Case.—Thomas Mooney, a labour organizer, was accused of having placed the bomb which exploded in the street of San Francisco during the “Preparedness Day” parade, July 22 1916, killing six persons instantly, mortally wounding four more, and injuring 40 others. Mooney pleaded not guilty, but he was sentenced to death. Many organizations of labour protested that the trial was not a fair one. Execution was postponed several times. It then appeared that much of the testimony on which he had been convicted was perjured. This was substantiated by the report of the investigation of the U.S. Department of Labor in July 1919, which condemned the conduct of the trial. Request for retrial, however, was refused, as not provided for by the constitution of California. Radical labour urged a general strike May 1 1918, to protest against letting the verdict stand. At Mooney's request the plan was dropped. In Nov. the governor of California commuted the sentence to life imprisonment. A plan for a general strike July 4 1919, to demand a new trial, was not taken up by the conservative unions.
International Relations.—During the war American labour awoke to an interest in international affairs. The American trade unions sent no delegate to the Inter-Allied Labour Conference in London in 1918, but that year the American Federation of Labor sent three small groups to Europe to confer unofficially with trade unionists in the Allied countries. The American Federation of Labor refused to be represented at the international labour conference in Berne held after the signing of the Armistice, on the ground that the conference would not express
