Page:George Henry Soule - Recent Developments in Trade Unionism (1921).pdf/22

 makers are in the same union, the painters, decorators and paperhangers are grouped together, etc. Furthermore, each of the craft unions has shown an increasing tendency to organize the unskilled and semi-skilled with which it was most closely associated. Thus within the most conservative unions themselves the tendency toward industrialism has cropped up in the formation of what may be called inter-craft unions.

Another expression of the tendency toward industrial unionism in the A. F. of L. has been the formation of "Departments". Thus, the Railway Employees' department is a national body consisting of delegates from all the various A. F. of L. unions which have members working on the railroads. In negotiations with the government or the private employers about railroad matters it fulfills many of the duties of an industrial union covering the railway lines of the country. The unions concerned, however, retain the craft form of organization for use where, as in the case of the machinists, the membership extends into many other industries also. Other departments cover the building trades, the food trades, the mining trades, and the printing trades. Some of these departments are active and powerful, hut others exist principally on paper.