The Industrial Workers of the World
In 1905 labor organizers, socialists, anarchists, Marxists, and others who believed the AFL to have become too conservative held a convention in Chicago in which they founded the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). The AFL’s belief in the concept of capitalism was the impetus for the radical rejection of it as the spokesman for the labor movement. IWW members became known as Wobblies, though the origination of the term is unknown. The Wobblies believed in overall industrial unionization, rather than craft unionization, another point of contention with the AFL.
The IWW welcomed workers regardless of their trade or craft, ethnicity, or gender, an unusual stance at the time. During the first decades of the twentieth century it was involved in several strikes and often clashed with other unions, clashes which sometimes became violent. Leaders of the Western Federation of Miners were critical to the formation of the IWW; by the summer of 1907 the WFM left the IWW, with the miners for the most part rejecting the radicalism of the Wobblies. This led to physical violence during several work stoppages in the western mines where members of both groups were present.
IWW members also came into conflict with workers represented by the United Mine Workers in the bituminous coal fields in 1916. The IWW objected to the UMW practice of negotiating labor contracts for established time periods with their employers, and established picket lines to prevent UMW workers from entering the mines and support shops. The UMW was forced to request protection from the Pennsylvania State Police in order to honor their contracts. State Police escorted UMW workers across the picket lines. Actions such as these brought the IWW into disrepute with the general public and anti-socialist groups.
The IWW opposed American intervention in the First World War, calling it a war for the benefit of the capitalists, to the detriment of the workers. During the war the anti-war stance of the IWW made it a target for the US government. IWW members and leaders were arrested for crimes including conspiring to evade the draft and other ant-war effort activities. One of its founders and leaders, Bill Haywood, was convicted under the espionage act and sentenced to prison by Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis. On bail pending appeal, Haywood fled to the Soviet Union, where he continued to reside for the rest of his life.
More than 150 IWW members and leaders were convicted under the Espionage Act near the end of the First World War, and during the ensuing Red Scare which followed that conflict. Through the 1930s the number of Wobblies wobbled downward. Following the Second World War the Taft-Hartley Act made communist leadership of American labor unions illegal, and membership dwindled yet further. It has since experienced something of a comeback in membership, and remains active in many organizing causes. Today, true to its name, the IWW has chapters around the world, spreading its message in all hemispheres.