Question

1. Was “labor violence” inevitable and unavoidable ? What factors played into causing much of the confrontation between unions and big business. 2. What were some of the different and mutual demands of the various national unions? What tactics did they employ to realize their demands? 3. When viewed from the perspective of the corporations, what do you think they were so adamant in opposing unions?

Answer 1

1 - Its hard to state if "labor violence" was inevitable and unavoidable, specially when not defined which side started the violence.

But two things are clear: the unions side lost many more lives than the corporates side, and in this beggining of industrialisation period there were inumerous abuses from the corporations, envolving wages, labor shifts, women and children rights. And that a study from 1969 shows that US has the the bloodiest and most violent labor history of any industrial nation in the world.

2 - The various national unions had mutual and different demands, regarding their own areas of work. Industrial workers would have different needs than construction workers, the same for rural workers and so on. But their demands were mostly envolving hour limits, child labor, workplace conditions, living wages and migrant workers.

In order to achieve their goals, unions had many tactics, some of them nowadays would be seen as guerilla tactics. Strikes were the most usual, when all workers would stop simultaneously, focusing their time in protests for their demands, usually in front of the workplace. Strikebreakers could also suffer violence from their striking peers.

Sabotage, riots and even assassination attempts were some more violent means to achieve their goals, despite the bad repercussion and legal implications.

3 - The corporations knew they needed their employees to deliver their services or products, but they know that too many labour rights would implicate in diminishing their profits. In a world coming back from the great depression, they needed to increase their gains, in orders to keep the Stock Market high. Also, in this meantime, the wolrd passed through two major conflits (WW I and II) and this also envolved the governments interest in keeping workers under control, in order to keep production of war equipments.

Answer 2

Labor unrest and confrontations between labor unions and employers in the United States has been present basically since the 19th century, as a response to the impact of the Industrial Revolution. National labor unions began in the post Civil War era and one of the first documented started operating in the 1880's, when most of the unrest began in response to the abuse and unfair treatment and lack of legal protection for workers against the big companies. Many of the industries were hit hard by the formation of these unions, but none more than the railroad and steel industries. 1. Labor violence could have been prevented and could have been avoided if: a) laws had been passed to protect workers better and b) If part of the plan of employers and officials to disband unions had not been to introduce spies and agitators into the unions´ ranks to create unrest so that the union would be blamed for causing trouble. 2. The unions were created to prevent the abuse of employers on workers on the topics of salary, worker´s unfair replacement, compensations. But also, to create a monopoly, meaning, workers wanted to ensure that companies could not simply get rid of workers from the union to replace them with non-unionized laborers. Usually these unions used strikes to put forth their demands and in many ocassions ended up attacking and killing strikebreakers and replacement workers instead of the employers themselves. 3. Because the formation of unions meant that workers were for the first time not willing to simply follow the instructions and demands of a company. They began joining together in an attempt to demand better working conditions, something companies did not have to face up until then. Also, the result of these constant strikes and the violence forced the state and national governments to take measures and pass laws that in the end did not benefit their companies.