knights of labor essays

knights of labor essays The successes and failures of the Knights of Labor, have generated many controversial issues that have helped shape the North American labor movement. The Knights of Labor were originally part of the Trades and Labor Congress of Canada when it was organized in 1886 but were expelled after the Berlin Convention in 1902. It was during these years that the Knights of Labor enjoyed their peak success, and also contributed to their disappearance before World War I. Unquestionably the Knights of Labor was a popular movement, and was growing at an alarming rate. The members put the labor movement on the map, reaching groups that had never been reached before and teaching things about land, money, immigration, and government ownership that had never been taught before. The Knights of Labor tried one way and failed, but is it appropriate to ask, who has found another way and succeeded? It is a mistake to think that the North American Labor movement has outgrown the Knights of Labor. In functions, organizations, and ideas, perhaps, but not in opinion. Emphasis on the principle of solidarity was the beginning of understanding the Knights of Labor. Strange names and titles, rituals, secrecy, forms of organization, and even activities, were all secondary principles. The main objective of the Order was to teach the American wage earner that he was a wage earner first and a bricklayer, shoemaker, carpenter, and/or miner ,etc. after. It also taught that he was a wage earner first and a Catholic, Protestant, Jew, white, black, Democrat, or Republican, after. However, the main objective of the order was to organize all nationalities, races, creeds, and grades of skill into one common labor union, in which all members earned their living by the sweat of their brow. The federation was a part fraternal, part union organization designed to settle labor disputes throughout North America. It drew many races of people including blacks,...