Guilded Age Organized Workers

They were very unsuccessful. They attempted plenty of times but with all the problems with the unsupportive government they didn't get far.

Late 19th century America was a time of both prosperity and poverty. Although it is often remembered by the luxurious lives of those like the Rockefellers and Carnegies, the majority of the population was a struggling working class. Entire families worked for 10 hours a day, 7 days a week in dangerous, unsanitary factories just to have enough money for dinner and the issue of upgrading these working conditions quickly came to the forefront of American reforms. The movement towards organized labor from 1875-1900 was unsuccessful in improving the position of workers because of the initial failure of strikes, the inherent feeling of superiority of employers over employees and the lack of governmental support. Since there was no groundwork to rationalizeÐ'...Ð'....

Relations and Conditions of Capital and Labor in 1899, that the right to strike was absolutely necessary if any reforms were going to be made and not even this right had been officially granted to the people by the government (Document I). In stating this, Gompers was making it clear that not even the very basis of organized labor had been established and so up until this point the advances that had been made, were virtually insignificant. The fact that the government had not addressed this issue and hadn't clearly stated that unions were permitted and that they had the right to strike seriously hindered the success of labor reforms.