Source: International Socialist Review, December 1912
Transcription/Markup: Bill Wright and Paul Saba
Copyleft: Internet Archive(marxists.org) 2018. Permission is granted to copy and/or distribute this document under the terms of the Creative Commons License.
At the recent convention of the International Molders’ Union of North America, held at Milwaukee, an event occurred that should prove most fruitful of results. The rebel delegates, numbering about 70 out of a total of 490, realizing the futility of craft unionism and the imperative need of revolutionary unionism amongst foundry workers, organized themselves into a propaganda organization with the avowed purpose of satisfying this need. They propose to make of the I. M. U. of N. A. a militant industrial union; a union that will include all workers in and around foundries and which will use the most approved tactics. To this end they are going to carry on a vigorous campaign of education throughout the I. M. U. of N. A. and foundry workers in general. They are going to publish a monthly paper through the columns of which they will at once carry on their propaganda, standardize their policies, combat reactionary influences and generally organize themselves so as to systematically go about placing the I. M. U. of N. A. on a revolutionary basis.
This propaganda organization is similar to those doing such good work in the ranks of the English trades unions and which were recently described in the International Socialist Review, in an article entitled, “Forces Making for Industrial Unionism. ” It is full of promise and doubtless will soon be a power in the I. M. U. of N. A. Such organizations might profitably be formed in the ranks of many other trade unions and thus the great field they present for propaganda and development, now sadly neglected, can be systematically exploited. The formation of the propaganda organization in the I. M. U. of N. A. is due mainly to the efforts of T. J. Mooney, of San Francisco, one of the men chiefly responsible for the publication of “Revolt. ” Mooney and other reds had long carried on an agitation in the molders’ union in Frisco (Pres. Valentine, of the I. M. U. of N. A., a member of the Civic Federation, belongs to this local) and the harvest of this agitation was reaped when the reds sent Mooney to the convention in spite of the strongest opposition on the part of Valentine, Nolan, etc.
Arrived at the convention, determined to carry on the fight, Mooney found the militant minority almost entirely unorganized, as is commonly the case at trade union conventions. When the nature of the fight which Mooney and the few others were making became clear the reds rallied to their support, and the permanent organization resulted. This organization is going to proceed immediately to its task and all molders and core makers interested in this work of making their union an effective one are asked to get in touch with T. J. Mooney, 1645 15th St., San Francisco, Cal.