“Unions were created to make living conditions just a little better than they were before they were created, and the union that does not manifest that kind of interest in human beings cannot endure.”
Those were the words of Philip Murray, born on this day in Labor History, the year was 1886.
Philip Murray was born in Blantyre, Scotland, the son of a union coal miner.
Philip went into the mines when he was only ten years old.
At the age of 16 he traveled to Pennsylvania with his father in search of work in the Pittsburgh area.
They earned enough money mining to send for their family.
As a young man Murray was fired for assaulting a boss.
Murray believed the boss was cheating when he weighed the coal.
His fellow miners went on strike in support, but he and his family were evicted from their company home.
The experience convinced Murray that the only justice for workers was through the power of the union.
In 1912 the United Mine Workers appointed Murray to their national Executive Board.
At the age of 33 he became national Vice President of the UMW under President John L. Lewis.
He was considered to be Lewis’s right hand man, until the two split on the question of the role of unions during World War II.
In 1936, Murray was trusted with an important new effort, leading the Steel Workers Organizing Committee as its first President.
Under Murray’s leadership Steel Workers Organizing Committee chartered more than 1,000 union locals by the end of the next year.
Just one week after the historic Flint sit-down strike forced General Motors to recognize the UAW member’s right to unionize
On March 2, 1937 the SWOC signed its landmark agreement with US Steel turning the company led union into a member led union.
Murray became the President of the Congress of Industrial Organizations in 1940 where he held until his death in 1952.
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