Page:William Z. Foster, James P. Cannon and Earl Browder - Trade Unions in America.djvu/5

 independent of the A. F. of L. The I. W. W. condemns all political parties, and confines itself entirely to the struggle on the industrial field. Sharp differences between it and European syndicalist unions are that it advocates a centralized administration and the industrial form of organization. It speaks of the overthrowal of capitalism by direct action and the establishment of a new society organized and controlled by the labor unions. The "One Big Union," a small independent union claiming to be a general labor movement, is a mixture of socialist and syndicalist tendencies.

The nationalist unions are to be found in Canada. They exist in the railroad and in other industries. They are described elsewhere herein. Most of them have developed out of secession movements away from the American international unions. Patriotic demogogues, taking advantage of the discontent of the Canadian workers at the domination of American union officials, have been able to get considerable numbers of the Canadians to withdraw and to found independent national unions. These, of course, are of an ultra-conservative character.

The Catholic unions are also located in Canada, especially in the very backward province of Quebec. The Catholic church organizes no separate unions in the United States. This is because it finds effective expression through the trade union leaders, a large number of whom are Irish Catholics. For many years a feature of all A. F. of L. conventions has been the Catholic priests there lobbying for measures wanted by their church.

The trade unions of the United States and Canada are numerically very weak. At present, out of an organizable working class of at least 20,000,000 workers, they comprise only 3,600,000. Of these 2,900,000 are in the American Federation of Labor, 600,000 are in independent conservative unions (railroad brotherhoods, clothing workers, etc.), and 100,000 in independent revolutionary organizations (I. W. W., U. L. C. of A., etc.). In the