was, on fundamentals, far more coherent than the Knights of Labor even in the heyday of their glory.  The officers and leaders of the Federation, knowing that they could not command, set themselves to developing a unified labor will and purpose by means of moral suasion and propaganda.  Where a bare order would breed resentment and backbiting, an appeal, which is reinforced by a carefully nurtured universal labor sentiment, will eventually bring about common consent and a willing acquiescence in the policy supported by the majority.  So each craft was made a self-determining unit and “craft autonomy” became a sacred shibboleth in the labor movement without interfering with unity on essentials.

The principle of craft autonomy triumphed chiefly because it recognized the existence of a considerable amount of group selfishness.  The Knights of Labor held, as was seen, that the strategic or bargaining strength of the skilled craftsman should be used as a lever to raise the status of the semi-skilled and unskilled worker.  It consequently grouped them promiscuously in “mixed assemblies” and opposed as long as it could the demand for “national trade assemblies.”  The craftsman, on the other hand, wished to use his superior bargaining strength for his own purposes and evinced little desire to dissipate it in the service of his humbler fellow worker.  To give effect to that, he felt obliged to struggle against becoming entangled with undesirable allies in the semi-skilled and unskilled workers for whom the Order spoke.  Needless to say, the individual self-interest of the craft leaders worked hand in hand with the self-interest of the craft as a whole, for had they been annexed by the Order they would have become subject to orders from the General Master Workman or the General Assembly of the Order.

In addition to platonic stirrings for “self-determination” and to narrow group interest, there was a motive for craft autonomy which could pass muster both as strictly social and realistic.  The fact was that the autonomous craft union could win strikes where the centralized promiscuous Order merely floundered and suffered defeat after defeat.  The craft union had the advantage, on the one hand, of a leadership which was thoroughly familiar with the bit of ground upon which it operated, and, on the other hand, of handling a group of people of equal financial endurance and of identical interest.  It has already been seen how dreadfully mismanaged were the great Knights of Labor strikes of 1886 and 1887.  The ease with which the leaders were able to call out trade after trade on a strike of sympathy proved more a liability than an asset.  Often the choice of trades to strike bore no particular relation to their strategic value in the given situation; altogether one gathers the impression that these great strikes were conducted by blundering amateurs who possessed more authority than was good for them or for the cause.  It is therefore not to be wondered