T H EGEORGE MEANY

MEMORIAL

AFL-CIOARCHIVE

at theUniversity of Maryland

With well-practiced care, a union construction worker makes his way across a metropolitan job site.

1

MARYLAND has long played a vital role in the

American labor movement and historians, sociologists, and

political scientists working at our state’s flagship campus

have been prominent scholars of that movement. The

university’s considerable talent as well as its distinguished

tradition of labor studies provide a first rate and world

class environment in which the AFL-CIO’s collections

can be used to their fullest. — Martin O’Malley, 2012

Governor of Maryland

WITH MATERIALS that fill six miles of shelving,

the George Meany Memorial AFL-CIO Archive is the

largest such donation to the University Libraries and pro -

vides an invaluable resource to scholars. Complementing

other labor-related collections in our libraries, the archive

establishes the university as a top archival repository for

labor history in North America.

These collections serve not only as the historical record of

the venerable labor organization, but also as a gateway

to understanding our shared history. Approximately

40 million documents and other materials will help

researchers better understand pivotal social movements

in this country, including those to gain rights for women,

children and minorities.

2

AFTER immigrating with his family to the United States in 1863, Samuel Gompers worked as a cigarmaker and joined the Cigar Makers’ International Union, Local 15 in New York City. Gompers later founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL) serving as president for 37 years, from 1886 to 1924, and is known as the father of the modern labor movement.

SAMUEL GOMPERS AND THE AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR

2

3

THE SAMUEL GOMPERS PAPERS constitute

a remarkable achievement; by demonstrating the central role

played by working people and the labor movement they built,

it has helped reframe our understanding of U.S. history.

— Richard N. Price and Philip M. Soergel

Professors and Chairs, UMD Department of History

Photo: Samuel Gompers (center) in the ante-

chamber of Governor Arthur Yager’s office,

Puerto Rico, March 26, 1914.

Left: American Federation of Labor (AFL) charter

application from the United Labor League of Philadelphia and Vicinity, March 22, 1896.

Below: Cigar box with color portrait of Samuel Gompers.

Archives of the Cigar Makers’ International Union, Special

Collections, University of Maryland Libraries.

44

Two boys work in dangerous conditions in a textile mill, ca 1900.

5

CHILD LABOR

THE AFL and its president Samuel Gompers battled against child labor in the early 20th century. American laborers were displaced by child workers at an alarming rate as industries looked for ways to lower wages in even the most dangerous of labor conditions. After multiple legislative battles, the U.S. Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, placing restrictions on child labor in general.

Members of the Women’s Trade Union League of New York picket against child labor and to support the eight hour day, ca 1909.

5

6

STATE “RIGHT TO WORK” laws have made a comeback

in the ongoing attempt to weaken the labor movement, but this is a

play we have seen before and defeated. In 1958, five such ballot efforts

were defeated under a national campaign led by Eleanor Roosevelt.

She wrote in the American Federationist that she opposed such

laws because the “real aim is to destroy American labor.” We have this

valuable historical context because of the Meany Memorial Archives.

— Brigid O’Farrell, Independent Scholar

6

7

TAFT-HARTLEY ACT

THE 1947 Taft-Hartley Act placed restrictions on labor unions that drastically reduced their ability to collectively bargain and collect dues from their members by effectively eliminating the closed shop. In a speech given shortly after it passed, George Meany declared that the law “completely demolishes the natural, organic development which is collective bargaining, and substitutes, instead, what at best is paternalistic statism, and at worst, out and out dictatorship.”

Labor union rally opposing the Taft-Hartley Bill, Madison Square Garden, 1947

7

8

GEORGE MEANY began his union experience as an apprentice plumber in 1910. Meany served in several leadership positions in the AFL before being elected its president in 1952. He was a key player in the negotiations for a merger between the AFL and the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) in December 1955, initially promoted by President Roosevelt in 1939.

GEORGE MEANY AND THE AFL-CIO

8

9

GEORGE MEANY AND THE AFL-CIO

Above: George Meany.

Left: George Meany and CIO president Walter Reuther clasp hands

at the AFL-CIO merger convention in New York

City on December 5, 1955. Photograph by

Frank Alexander.

9

10

CIVIL RIGHTS

WHILE UNION LEADERS feared potential conflict between protecting union interests and civil rights for people of color, leaders within the civil rights movement were ardent supporters of labor rights as a civil rights issue. The two groups frequently worked together to achieve their goals.

“The two most dynamic and cohesive liberal forces in the country are the labor movement and the Negro freedom movement,” said Martin Luther King, Jr., shortly before his assassination in 1968. “I look forward confidently to the day when all who work for a living will be one, with no thought to the separateness as Negroes, Jews, Italians or any other distinctions.”

10

11

THE MEANY ARCHIVES are an invaluable resource for

both researchers and unionists. In 1958, Colorado and California

unionists reached out to local civil rights organizations. That was ex-

actly the kind of alliance that stopped the repeal of labor rights. There

is still much the present day labor movement can learn from its past.

— Dr. Elizabeth Tandy Shermer

Cambridge University

Paul Mellon Fellow of American History

Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. walks an International

Chemical Workers Union (ICWU) picket line (1964).

11

1212

13

I am excited at the possibility of

utilizing the archives both for my own

research and for my students working

in the field of labor studies.

— Seung-Kyung Kim

Professor and Chair

Department of Women’s Studies

WORKING WOMEN

WOMEN had long been engaged in workers’ rights through “ladies auxiliaries” where they supported their union-working husbands or as workers themselves in occupations such as the garment industry. During World War II, however, women were encouraged to work in jobs previously held by men. This massive entry into the workforce gave way to the rise of the feminist movement as the gender barrier to male-dominated jobs could no longer be argued.

Today women are a driving force within America’s labor unions and are predicted by labor scholars to outnumber men in labor unions within the next 10 years.

Jean Williams, a West Virginia native, outside Armco Mine entrance (1980). Williams worked five years in the coal mines of her home state. Photograph by Martha Tabor.

14

THROUGHOUT American history, immigrants have been essential to farming and industrial labor. Immigrants experienced rapid growth in American labor in the aftermath of World War II, as the United States began allowing temporary workers from Mexico to work the fields. These workers were needed to replace Americans who had joined the war effort. After the war, many of these workers began organizing across the country, demanding better work conditions and the ability to unionize. Today, immigrants have become an important life-blood to unions, as they provide a fresh energetic membership base.

14

15

First grapes (from California’s Coachella Valley)

with the union label of the United

Farm Workers reach the New

York market and produce a V for

Victory reaction (1970).

15

16

THE MEANY ARCHIVES collected

records about all the member unions that have

ever been in the American Federation of Labor,

including many that were short-lived and obscure.

Without those files, I fear that it would be utterly

impossible for anyone to understand what organi-

zations constituted the AFL in its early years, let

alone what the lives of their members were ever

like. — Jonathan Rees, Professor of History

Colorado State University, Pueblo

ORGANIZATIONS WITH COLLECTIONS & RECORDS IN THE GEORGE MEANY MEMORIAL AFL-CIO ARCHIVE

l AFL-CIO Trade Departments:

Building and Construction Trades Department

Metal Trades Department

Maritime Trade Department

Department for Professional Employees

Union Labor and Services Trades Department

Transportation Trades Department

l American Center for International Labor Solidarity

l George Meany Center for Labor Studies: National Labor College

l Working for America Institute

For questions related to use and access of the archives, call 301-405-9212.

For information about how to make a contribution to support the AFL-CIO Archive or to donate a related collection, call (301) 314-5674.

www.lib.umd.edu

Detail from early labor union banner, ca. 1890