CHAPTER III

Within the Trade Union Movement

 

Te historical summary has revealed that a variety of organizations are
interested in workers’ education. In accordance with their particular func-
tional philosophies, trade unions, political parties, fraternal organizations,
cooperatives, and social and cultural groups have planned different educational
activities for workers, thus making the movement complex and amorphous.
A study of the patterns within the respective agencies, therefore, is necessary
for a complete picture of the subject.*

Young labor organizations, with stability as their goal, are utilizing educa-
tional techniques developed by three trade unions, which were pioneers in the
field, namely, the International Ladies’ Garment Workers, the American Fed-
eration of Hosiery Workers, and the Amalgamated Clothing Workers.’

The three groups were atypical of labor organizations of their time in that
they initiated instruction for workers soon after they were founded in 1900,
1913, and 1914, respectively." Their educational patterns, therefore, have
helped shape workers’ education throughout the entire trade union move-
ment. The following pages describe the techniques as developed by them.

*Two students, Sophie Cambria and Edythe Norwick, of the Carola Woerishoffer
Graduate Department of Social Economy and Social Research of Bryn Mawr College,
aided in collecting material for this section in 1937-38.

* Hereafter when these three organizations are referred to together, they will be desig-
nated the I.L.G.W.U,, the A.F.H.W., and the A.C.W.A.

* The Cleveland Convention of the I.L.G.W.U. in 1914 laid the foundation of the
present educational work. In that year trade union courses were arranged in the Rand
School of Social Science. After experimentation a the Waist and Dressmakers’ Local
in New York City in 1915, education was expanded on a national scale in the following
year, The A.F.H.W. made its first educational effort in its Paterson and Milwaukee locals
in 1917 and 1918 respectively. The A.C.W.A. began its program of education in 1917.
The expansion of this program has been more halting, however, than that of the
LL.G.W.U.

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