MIA: History: USA: Publications: American Labor Union Journal
American Labor Union Journal
1902 – 1904
Introduction
The official organ of the ALU was the American Labor Union Journal, a weekly newspaper published every Thursday in Butte, Montana. The paper debuted in October 1902; the first seven issues published have apparently not survived.
The paper proudly marched under the banner of the Socialist Party of America (SPA), with the earliest surviving issue featuring the party's platform, an article by Appeal to Reason publisher J.A. Wayland, another piece by Socialist educator and orator Walter Thomas Mills, another piece by Christian socialist J. Stitt Wilson, and a reprint from Wage Labor and Capital by Karl Marx. Subsequent issues over the following weeks included material written by an array of socialist worthies, including orator Eugene V. Debs, radical priest Thomas J. Hagerty, International Socialist Review editor A.M. Simons, that magazine's publisher, Charles H. Kerr, journalist Ernest Untermann, Christian socialists Carl D. Thompson and Franklin H. Wentworth, Canadian impossibilist Charlie O’Brien, and Wisconsinite Winfield Gaylord,
In addition to a range of material relating to the organization and affairs of the ALU, the Journal covered the activities of the federations participant members, including the Western Federation of Miners and the United Brotherhood of Railway Employees. It also provided regular coverage of the vigorous organized labor movement in Butte.
The much ballyhooed "monster edition" produced for Labor Day 1903 proved to be the swan-song for the ALU Journal as a Socialist Party paper. Thereafter, as size of the paper contracted to 4 pages, the smorgasbord of socialist propaganda slowed to a trickle and a new industrial unionist orientation came to the fore. Even before the Labor Day issue the change was foretold when the slogan "No Politics in the Union" began to appear above the front page banner.
In January 1905, ALU Journal was replaced by a monthly called Voice of Labor, with a growing syndicalist editorial line. The union would go on to become one of the primary founding organizations of the Industrial Workers of the World in 1905.
Tim Davenport
Corvallis, OR
February 2019
1902
Vol. 1, No. 8, November 27, 1902
Vol. 1, No. 9, December 4, 1902
Vol. 1, No. 10, December 11, 1902
Vol. 1, No. 11, December 28, 1902
1903
Vol. 1, No. 13, January 1, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 14, January 8, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 15, January 15, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 16, January 22, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 17, January 29, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 18, February 5, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 19, February 12, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 20, February 19, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 21, February 26, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 23, March 12, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 24, March 19, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 25, March 26, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 28, April 16, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 29, April 23, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 30, April 30, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 44, August 6, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 45, August 13, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 46, August 20, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 47, August 27, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 48, September 3, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 49, September 10, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 50, September 17, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 51, September 24, 1903
Vol. 1, No. 52, October 1, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 1, October 8, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 2, October 15, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 3, October 22, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 4, October 29, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 5, November 5, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 6, November 12, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 7, November 19, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 8, November 26, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 9, December 3, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 10, December 10, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 11, December 17, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 12, December 24, 1903
Vol. 2, No. 13, December 31, 1903
1904
Vol. 2, No. 14, January 7, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 15, January 14, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 16, January 21, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 17, January 28, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 18, February 4, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 19, February 11, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 20, February 18, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 21, February 25, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 23, March 10, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 24, March 17, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 25, March 24, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 26, March 31, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 28, April 14, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 29, April 21, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 30, April 28, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 38, September, 1904
Vol. 2, No. 40, November, 1904
1905
Vol. 3, No. 5, February, 1905 Vol. 3, No. 6, March, 1905 Vol. 3, No. 7, April, 1905 Vol. 3, No. 8, May, 1905 Vol. 3, No. 9, June and final issue, 1905
Last updated on 18 January 2019