Knights of Labor

Knights of Labor American labor organization, started by Philadelphia tailors in 1869, led by Uriah S. Stephens. It became a body of national scope and importance in 1878 and grew more rapidly after 1881, when its earlier secrecy was abandoned. Organized on an industrial basis, with women, black workers (after 1883), and employers welcomed, excluding only bankers, lawyers, gamblers, and stockholders, the Knights of Labor aided various groups in strikes and boycotts, winning important strikes on the Union Pacific in 1884 and on the Wabash RR in 1885. But failure in the Missouri Pacific strike in 1886 and the Haymarket Square riot (for which it was, although not responsible, condemned by the press) caused a loss of prestige and strengthened factional disputes between the craft unionists and the advocates of all-inclusive unionism. With the motto "an injury to one is the concern of all," the Knights of Labor attempted through educational means to further its aims—an 8-hour day, abolition of child and convict labor, equal pay for equal work, elimination of private banks, cooperation—which, like its methods, were highly idealistic. The organization reached its apex in 1886, when under Terence V. Powderly its membership reached a total of 702,000. Among the causes of its downfall were factional disputes, too much centralization with a resulting autocracy from top to bottom, mismanagement, drainage of financial resources through unsuccessful strikes, and the emergence of the American Federation of Labor. By 1890 its membership had dropped to 100,000, and in 1900 it was practically extinct.

Bibliography: See P. S. Foner and R. L. Lewis, ed., Black Worker: The Era of the Knights of Labor (1979).

Knights of Labor A US industrial trade union, founded in 1869 at a tailors' meeting in Philadelphia. By 1879 it was organized on a national basis, with membership open to all workers. Its goals were reformist rather than radical, and included the demand for an eight-hour day. Its growth was phenomenal. In 1882 the Knights helped push through Congress the Chinese Exclusion Act, prohibiting the entry into the USA of Chinese labourers. The union was at its height in 1886 under the leadership of Terence V. Powderly, with a membership of almost a million, but declined thereafter, partly due to involvement in unsuccessful strikes and to general antipathy to labour organizations after the HAYMARKET SQUARE RIOT. Factional disputes reduced its membership after the AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR was founded, and by 1900 it was virtually extinct.