![]() All apprentices and journeymen had to have working cards showing paid union dues. The ITU Book of Laws would be amended many times, yet it was as members called it "ITU Law." Each union shop was a " Chapel" and the shop steward was the "Chapel Chairman". In 1873, at Montreal, Canada, the first ITU convention outside the United States was held. In 1869, a new Constitution was adopted, accepting the affiliation of Canadian printing trade unions and changing the name to the International Typographical Union. A random drawing enabled the Indianapolis local to become Local Union #1 and the new headquarters. While they resolved to form a national union, no other actions were taken.įinally, delegates from typographers' unions in 14 cities met in Cincinnati in May 1852 and organized the National Typographical Union. The representatives met again in Baltimore in September 1851. A committee led by John Keyser of Philadelphia was formed to investigate issues and propose a plan of action. The concept for a typographical union was formed at a New York City meeting of 18 representatives from typographers' associations in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Kentucky in December 1850. Before its dissolution, the ITU was the oldest union in the United States. ![]() In 1986, a majority of ITU mailers voted to merge with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the remaining typographers joined the Communications Workers of America. For most of its history, the ITU benefited from friendly and strong competition between Independents and Progressives for control of the union.Īs the work of typographers declined with automation, computers and mechanization of the print media, the ITU was disbanded. All contracts had to be approved and ratified by both the Executive Council and the newspaper publisher. The local scale committees worked for a decent wage while the executive council sent ITU representatives to assist local unions in contract negotiations. The ITU had a unique system of factional opposition in its democratic elections, documented by Seymour Martin Lipset in his co-authored book Union Democracy: The Internal Politics of the International Typographical Union (1957). That ITU initiative spread to other unions and has since been codified across the labor sector by federal legislation in the US establishing the 40-hour work week. During the Great Depression, the ITU introduced the 40-hour work week across the industry at no cost to employers as a way to share the fewer jobs available. Prescott led the ITU in 1897 to win a 48-hour work week and a standard wage scale for all printers. ![]() This led the union to the forefront of improving working conditions. Typographers were educated, economically mobile, in every major urban center with newspapers, and had the unique possibility to influence publicity in favour of their cause. The ITU was one of the first unions to admit female members, admitting women members such as Augusta Lewis, Mary Moore and Eva Howard in 1869. It was founded on May 3, 1852, in the United States as the National Typographical Union, and changed its name to the International Typographical Union at its Albany, New York, convention in 1869 after it began organizing members in Canada. The International Typographical Union (ITU) was a US trade union for the printing trade for newspapers and other media.
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