The open shop movement was an attempt on the part of corporations, trade associations, chambers of commerce, and their political supporters to weaken the organized labor movement by requiring employees to work in an open or nonunion workplace. Gains in labor union membership in the early 20th century prompted sharp responses from employers and businessmen, and antiunion organizations such as the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) and the American Anti-Boycott Association organized campaigns at both the local and national level aimed against strikes, boycotts, and political action among workers. Although the majority of employers had long opposed labor unions and resisted the closed or union shop (whereby workers were required to join the union as a condition of their employment), the open shop movement began in earnest in response to the wave of labor unrest that followed World War I.
The labor movement gained strength between 1900 and 1918. Union membership increased from 2 million in 1904 to 5 million in 1920. As the power of the labor movement increased, unions began demanding closed or union shops. The main advantage of the closed shop was that unions did not have to continually recruit new employees in order to maintain their presence. Most employers resisted any form of organized labor, and they especially opposed the closed shop. The wave of labor unrest that followed the end of the war, most notably the massive Steel Strike of 1919, convinced business leaders of the need to fight labor with a united front.
At a 1919 meeting on industrial relations called by President Woodrow Wilson, business leaders such as Henry Clay Frick, Judge Elbert Gary, and John D. Rockefeller, Jr., came up with a plan to roll back the gains made by organized labor. Dubbed the American Plan, it encouraged employers not to negotiate with labor unions and launched a campaign to convince the American public that the closed shop and the labor movement in general were “un-American.” Tapping into the patriotism unleashed during the war, backers of the open shop movement insisted that, because employees were required to become union members, the closed shop was unfair and undemocratic. NAM president John Edgerton stated “I can’t conceive of any principle that is more purely American. . . than the open shop principle.”
By 1920, a network of open shop organizations had spread throughout the country and the labor movement was on the defensive. Although the open shop movement was couched in patriotic terms, in reality it was little more than a concerted effort to roll back many of the wartime gains made by organized labor. Many employers who publicly championed the open shop as a workplace that welcomed both union and nonunion employees were bitterly opposed to any union presence. U. S. Steel, for example, had endured a five-month-long strike in 1919 rather than negotiate a contract with the National Committee for Organizing Iron and Steel Workers. Throughout the strike and even after, its president insisted that he would close every steel mill he owned before he agreed to a union contract. When combined with the Red Scare, the open shop movement had a devastating impact on the labor movement. By 1929 union membership had fallen to 3.5 million.
Further reading: Irving Bernstein, The Lean Years: A History of the American Worker, 1920-1933 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1960).
—Robert Gordon
Palmer, Alexander Mitchell (1872-1936) attorney general
A. Mitchell Palmer was the attorney general who spearheaded the post-WoRLD War I raids against suspected socialists, communists, radicals, and others who had opposed American entry into the war. Born in Moosehead, Pennsylvania, in 1872, Palmer was brought up in a strict Quaker family. After attending Swarthmore College, he joined the Pennsylvania Bar in 1893 and became involved in Democratic Party politics. He used his legal and political connections to launch his own political career. He was elected to the House of Representatives in 1909 and held his seat until 1915. As a member of the House, Palmer was an early supporter of Woodrow Wilson’s presidential campaign in 1912, but his political career suffered a serious setback in 1916 when he was defeated in his bid to win a seat in the Senate.
During the time he spent in Congress, Palmer was closely identified with the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and earned a reputation as a defender of woman suffrage and labor unions. His political career was revived in 1919 when Woodrow Wilson, rewarding Palmer’s long-standing support, nominated him to become attorney general. American involvement in World War I had caused a serious rift among progressives, socialists, and pacifists, between those who supported American entry into the war and those who opposed it. Concerned about the public’s long-standing isolationism, the Wilson administration was determined to rally public support for the war effort. Key components of its efforts to ensure public support were an all-out public relations campaign, spearheaded by the Committee for Public Information, and the silencing of antiwar critics, best exemplified by the passage of the Espionage Act (1917) and the Sedition Act (1918). The fact that some progressives supported U. S. entry into World War I made it easier for the administration to crack down on those who dissented.
Even though the war ended in November 1918, the outbreak of the Russian Revolution had convinced many in the government of the need for even greater vigilance and suppression of political dissent.
By the time Palmer became attorney general, he was convinced that the Bolsheviks were intent upon launching a worldwide revolution and overthrowing the American government. In response, Mitchell hired J. Edgar Hoover as his special assistant. The Justice Department used the Espionage and Sedition acts to silence radical and left-wing dissent. Nevertheless, political and labor unrest escalated after the war. By the fall of 1919, Palmer was convinced that domestic and international communists and anarchists were determined to overthrow the American government. In response, on November 7, 1919, he authorized the arrest of more than 10,000 suspected communists, radicals, anarchists, immigrants, and dissidents. Many of those arrested during the first Palmer Raid were detained for days without a trial. A second raid took place in January 1920, with the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) as its main focus. Although most of those arrested in the Palmer raids were eventually released and no charges filed, several hundred were ultimately deported from the country.
By early 1920, when it became clear that no revolution or uprising had ever been in the works, public opinion turned sharply against Palmer and the Wilson administration. The Palmer Raids and the Red Scare of 1919-21 not only devastated the already weakened labor movement but also established a long-standing tradition of hostility and paranoia toward the political left.
Further reading: Stanley Coben, A. Mitchell Palmer: Politician (New York: Columbia University Press, 1963).
—Robert Gordon
Palmer Raids See Red Scare.
World History
