American Federation of Labor

The Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions of the United States and Canada was formed in Pittsburgh in November 1881. Its 1884 convention resolved that eight hours should constitute a day’s work after May 1, 1886. The Haymarket Riot in Chicago on May 4, 1886, set off a wave of antiradicalism that damaged the eight-hour movement.⁠[1]

In October 1886 the Knights of Labor rejected the proposed “treaty.”⁠[1]

After the Knights of Labor rejected a proposal to reaffirm the separation of trade-union and labor-reform functions, craft unions led by Samuel Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor in December 1886.⁠[2]

The federation was born at a meeting on December 8, 1886, in Columbus, OhioOhioOhio is a state in the Midwestern United States; its capital is Columbus. It joined the Union in 1803 as the 17th state, the first carved from the Northwest Territory, and its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 11,799,448.Open the full entry; Samuel Gompers was elected president and Peter J. McGuire became its first secretary.⁠[1]

The AFL began as a loose federation of smaller craft unions, such as those of masons, hat makers and cigar makers.⁠[3]

Samuel Gompers served as president every year except 1895 until his death in 1924. He concentrated on wages and working conditions, excluded unskilled workers and avoided radical political programs. The AFL had 265,000 members in 1897 and more than 500,000 by 1900.⁠[2][3][1]

The 1912 election of the Democrat Woodrow WilsonWoodrow WilsonWoodrow Wilson (1856–1924) was an American scholar and politician who served as president of Princeton University and governor of New Jersey and was the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921, leading the country through World War I and proposing the League of Nations.Open the full entry as president improved the political climate for labor. In 1913 Eugene Kinckle Jones of the National Urban LeagueNational Urban LeagueThe National Urban League is a civil rights and urban advocacy organization headquartered in New York City. It grew out of the National League on Urban Conditions Among Negroes, formed by a merger in New York City in the early 1910s, and works to help African Americans advance economic and social justice.Open the full entry led a meeting of Black leaders with Gompers, a first step toward organizing Black labor.⁠[2][4]

William Green succeeded Gompers as president in 1924 and held the office until his death in 1952. Union enrollment slowed at the start of the Great Depression; the Wagner Act of 1935 barred employers from interfering with union activities and established the National Labor Relations Board.⁠[3][2]

In 1935 John L. Lewis of the United Mine Workers led a faction within the AFL that formed the Committee for Industrial Organization to organize mass-production industries on an industry-wide basis. The AFL, which opposed organizing unskilled workers, revoked the charters of 10 dissident unions; in 1938 the committee was renamed the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and became an independent federation. By 1941 the CIO had organized the steel and automobile industries.⁠[3][2]

In 1952 George Meany became president of the AFL; that year Walter Reuther became president of the CIO after the death of Philip Murray, who had led the CIO since John L. Lewis resigned in 1940.⁠[3][5]

In June 1954, 65 AFL unions and 29 CIO unions pledged to abandon membership raids. A formal merger agreement was reached in February 1955.⁠[5]

The merger was ratified on December 5, 1955, in New York City, uniting the AFL and the CIO as the AFL-CIO. George Meany became president of the AFL-CIO (1955–1979) and Walter Reuther a vice president. All unions holding charters from either federation could join; executive council posts were divided in proportion to the former federations’ relative membership, assets were pooled, and both craft and industrial unionism were recognized.⁠[5]

The merged AFL-CIO represented about 15 million workers; at the time of the merger the CIO had 32 affiliated international unions and an estimated five million members.⁠[2][3]

In 1957 the AFL-CIO expelled two affiliates for corruption. In 1965 it formed the A. Philip Randolph Institute and supported César Chávez’s United Farm Workers Organizing Committee.⁠[3]

In August 2021, after the unexpected death of Richard Trumka, the AFL-CIO executive council elected Liz Shuler president, the first woman to lead the federation; Fred Redmond, an international vice president of the United Steelworkers, was elected secretary-treasurer, the No. 2 office, becoming the first African American to hold it.⁠[6]

As of November 2026 the AFL-CIO is led by President Liz Shuler and Secretary-Treasurer Fred Redmond and represents more than 15 million members. Its Executive Council, elected at the quadrennial convention, sets broad policy, and between council meetings an Executive Committee governs the federation.⁠[7]

The AFL-CIO is a voluntary federation with limited authority over its member unions, though it can expel a union for corruption or enforce resolutions on jurisdictional disputes.⁠[3]

AFL-CIO: Official website: https://aflcio.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[7]