Redalyc.Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor In

Centro Journal ISSN: 1538-6279 [email protected] The City University of New York Estados Unidos

Sanabria, Carlos Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor in Puerto Rico Centro Journal, vol. XVII, núm. 1, spring, 2005, pp. 140-161 The City University of New York New York, Estados Unidos

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CENTRO Journal

Volume7 xv1i Number 1 spring 2005 Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor in Puerto Rico

CARLOS SANABRIA

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the role that Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor played in Puerto Rico during the early years of the twentieth century. Specifically, it traces the origins of the Federación Libre’s association to AFL and Gompers’ effort to promote his views among workers on the island. It also examines his thinking in regard to the relationship of Puerto Rico to the United States, as well as the aid the American Federation of Labor provided the FLT. It shows the AFL provided the Federación Libre important political, financial, and organizational support and protected the rights of island workers to organize labor unions and strike for higher pay, shorter hours of work, and better labor conditions. Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor also campaigned to safeguard their freedom of assembly and their rights to free speech and a free press. In addition, the AFL provided the FLT the services of paid labor organizers and strike fund benefits. Organizationally, it facilitated the growth of the island’s labor movement by commissioning and monitoring the work of local volunteer organizers and by chartering labor unions. This assistance allowed the FLT to survive in the context of the hostile, and very often violent, opposition of local employers and government officials. This essay proves that the AFL played a significant part in the history of organized labor in Puerto Rico, but questions the extent to which this influence determined its politics. [Key words: labor history, Samuel Gompers, AFL, Federación Libre, Puerto Rico, colonialism]

Studio photo of Gompers, taken in San Juan, 1904. Photographer G. Fredericksen. Reprinted, by permission, from The George Meany Memorial Archives.

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AFL, the Federación Libre acted independently of the American Federation of Labor. As proof, he cited the founding of the Partido Socialista as a deviation from Gompers’ strategy of using the labor vote as a way of “rewarding friends and punishing enemies.”5 American political scientist Robert W. Anderson agreed with Lewis’ analysis of he study of the organized labor Santiago Iglesias’ brand of socialism. He viewed Iglesias as a pragmatic leader movement in Puerto Rico as representedT by the Federación Libre de los Trabajadores “untouched by the subtleties of European Socialism.”6 On the other hand, Anderson de Puerto Rico (FLT) and the Partido Socialista (PS) is of great importance due to claimed the AFL did indeed strongly influence organized labor in Puerto Rico. the prominent role these organizations played in Puerto Rican society and politics He argued that at least until 1915 Santiago Iglesias readily accepted “Gompers’s during the early decades of the twentieth century. Under the leadership of Santiago theory of the political role and nature of the labor movement.”7 Anderson explained Iglesias Pantín, by 1919 the Federación Libre claimed a membership of some 18,000 the establishment of the Partido Socialista, in contradiction to Gompers’ political workers organized into 143 chartered local and central labor unions.1 Its membership ideas, as the result of the partisan nature of island politics. However, he attributed included thousands of unskilled agricultural laborers, mostly sugarcane workers, and the PS’s undoctrinaire and non-ideological politics to Puerto Rican political hundreds of women in the cigar industry. In the elections of 1924, on the other hand, tradition, Santiago Iglesias’ personality, and Samuel Gompers’ influence.8 the Partido Socialista, founded in 1915 as the political wing of the FLT, obtained Puerto Rican historian Blanca Silvestrini also stressed Samuel Gompers’ influence 56,103 votes. This represented 22 percent of all the ballots cast.2 on the workers’ movement in Puerto Rico. She acknowledged that the participation Established by urban artisans in 1899, the Federación Libre became an affiliate of of FLT unions in electoral campaigns represented an area of disagreement between the American Federation of Labor (AFL) in September of 1901. Thereafter, Samuel the AFL and the Puerto Rican labor movement. Nevertheless, she concluded that Gompers and the AFL served as important allies of organized workers in Puerto the American Federation of Labor had a significant impact on organized labor in Rico. Samuel Gompers, a cigar maker by trade, emigrated from London to the Puerto Rico through its emphasis on the organization of workers by trades and the United States in 1863. He served as the major spokesperson for the U.S. labor control of strikes by its central leadership.9 movement until his death in 1924. Except for the year 1895, he was the President of Arturo Morales Carrión was another historian who emphasized the influence of the American Federation of Labor from when it was founded in 1886 until the year Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor in Puerto Rico. He concluded he died. Under his leadership, the AFL emphasized the organization of skilled that Iglesias paid a heavy price for the powerful allies and protection he received from workers by trade and campaigned tirelessly for higher wages, a shorter work day, Gompers and the AFL. Morales Carrión argued that although Iglesias began as a and better working conditions for labor union members. The AFL functioned as a Marxist-influenced socialist, he became Gompers’ faithful disciple and converted to federation of autonomous craft unions. It was a conservative organization that “American trade unionism, the doctrines of U.S. constitutionalism, and the intricacies fervently opposed socialism and the idea of a labor party. of U.S. politics, and the propaganda system the A.F. of L. used to spread its gospel.”10 This essay focuses on the role that Samuel Gompers and the American Federation For Carrión, Gompers represented an eager tutor who sought to Americanize Puerto of Labor played in Puerto Rico during the early decades of the twentieth century, Rican labor attitudes, structures, and methods. Carrión believed that “with Iglesias at particularly in the years before 1915. It begins by surveying the controversy that exists the helm, many of the [island’s labor] leaders were willing to answer Gompers’ call to among scholars in regard to the influence the U.S. labor movement had on organized action and embrace the new strong fatherland and its promised freedom.”11 workers on the island. After highlighting the usefulness of researching AFL In its most extreme form, this line of interpretation views Samuel Gompers and documentary sources, the rest of the article is taken up with a close examination of the American Federation of Labor as agents of the imperialist bourgeoisie of the the ways in which Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor United States and its colonial policy in Puerto Rico. As such, the AFL is depicted as intervened among organized workers in Puerto Rico. undermining the militancy and radical politics of the Federación Libre. In addition, Gompers and the AFL are portrayed as instrumental in furthering support for U.S. Differences of interpretation citizenship and statehood for Puerto Rico. Historians and other social scientists have expressed different interpretations Wilfredo Matos Cintrón is among those who have claimed the AFL played a regarding the political ideology of the early Puerto Rican labor movement and in primary role in promoting “yankee imperialism” on the island.12 Matos Cintrón respect to the role and influence that Samuel Gompers and the American Federation declared that while the AFL’s appeal for the extension of democratic rights to Puerto of Labor had on Santiago Iglesias Pantín and the Federación Libre de los Trabajadores Rico seemed progressive, it was in fact reactionary to the extent that it played into de Puerto Rico. In Puerto Rico, Freedom and Power in the Caribbean, British scholar the hands of U.S. interests by weakening the anticolonial united front that might Gordon K. Lewis portrayed the island’s early labor movement in highly unflattering have been forged between workers exploited by U.S. corporations on the island and terms. Lewis claimed that from the very beginning this movement had surrendered local hacendados, the commercial farm owners who opposed U.S. colonial policies in to “a bogus social and political radicalism.”3 He characterized Santiago Iglesias’ Puerto Rico as detrimental to their economic interests. Juan Ángel Silén is another political thinking as “an eloquent confusion of disparate and ill-digested ideas writer who emphasized the crucial part the American Federation of Labor played in gathered indiscriminately from Marxism, Spanish syndicalism, and American labor subordinating Puerto Rican workers to the process of political annexation to the of the Gompers style.”4 However, he maintained that although affiliated to the United States. In addition, he argues that the Federación Libre’s affiliation to the

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AFL resulted in acquiescence to its reformist politics, the organization of workers relating to the labor movement in Puerto Rico; and the Samuel Gompers Letterbooks, by trade, and the development of an incipient labor aristocracy.13 which contain the voluminous correspondence which Gompers, as President of the A very different perspective is presented in the work of Ángel Quintero Rivera American Federation of Labor, maintained for nearly three decades with labor and Gervasio García. In contrast to most of the studies cited above, their analysis leaders in Puerto Rico. stressed the early labor movement’s genuine socialist ideology and the FLT’s For many years after their affiliation, the AFL rendered the Federación Libre independence from the American Federation of Labor. Ángel Quintero Rivera important political, financial, and organizational support. It protected the rights of challenged Gordon Lewis and Robert Anderson’s view that the early labor movement island workers to organize labor unions and strike for higher pay, shorter hours of in Puerto Rico was never really radical or truly socialist. Quintero claimed that at the work, and better labor conditions. Samuel Gompers and the American Federation start of the century radical artisan workers followed a libertarian socialist ideology of Labor also campaigned to safeguard their freedom of assembly and their rights to that influenced the labor movement for several decades. According to Quintero, free speech and a free press. In addition, the AFL provided the FLT the services of the Partido Socialista sought a radical transformation of Puerto Rican society. paid labor organizers as well as strike fund benefits. Organizationally, the American Moreover, he argued that by 1924 island politics revolved primarily around the Puerto Federation of Labor sought to facilitate the growth of the island’s labor movement Rican working class movement and that its militancy and resolute socialist politics by commissioning and monitoring the work of local volunteer organizers and by threatened the hacendados and the island’s capitalist plantation system as a whole.14 chartering local labor unions. In an essay on the origins of the Puerto Rican labor movement, Gervasio García At the same time, Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor noted the importance of analyzing whether the organized workers of Puerto Rico promoted the basic ideals of their trade unionist ideology in Puerto Rico. subserviently followed AFL dictates or pursued a course of action outlined by their They emphasized the organization of workers into labor unions and the use of own leaders and determined by circumstances in Puerto Rico. While acknowledging strikes and collective bargaining to improve wages and the conditions of labor. that the FLT developed within the context of its affiliation to the American Moreover, Samuel Gompers and the AFL actively supported the belief that Puerto Federation of Labor, García concluded that the affinity between the politics of the Rico formed part of the United States and that its people should be afforded U.S. two federations was only coincidental and not always maintained. According to citizenship, and the island admitted as a state of the union. These activities of the García, both federations viewed the organization of the working class as their primary AFL are explored in this essay. This is done in the hope of making a contribution goal, and political participation as secondary. However, García claimed they applied to the discussion of the influence that Samuel Gompers and the American this principle differently, with the FLT being decidedly more political than the AFL.15 Federation of Labor had on the politics and ideology of the organized labor García argued that Anderson was incorrect when he claimed that at least until 1915 movement in Puerto Rico during the early decades of the twentieth century. organized workers in Puerto Rico followed AFL policy. Instead, he agreed with Lewis’ view that the FLT acted independently of the American Federation of Labor. The Federación Libre and the American Federation of Labor In their book Desaf o y solidaridad: breve historia del movimiento obrero puertorrique o, The United States’ annexation of Puerto Rico accelerated the island’s economic Gervasio García and Ángel Quintero Rivera state that during the early years of their transformation as a mainly pre-capitalist and still largely subsistence agricultural affiliation, the American Federation of Labor remained mostly indifferent towards society gave way to a thoroughly capitalist system of production. The rapid the Federation Libre.16 This indifference, they claimed, guaranteed the autonomous proletarianization of rural agricultural laborers and urban artisans was the result development of the island’s labor movement.17 This claim is supported by Francisco of the large-scale expropriation, concentration, and centralization of land, A. Scarano. According to Scarano, the labor movement in Puerto Rico developed and the introduction of the factory system. For the growing working class, primarily as a result of the conditions that prevailed on the island. These conditions these developments led to increasing levels of unemployment, low wages, included a large number of rural agricultural laborers, many unskilled urban workers, wretched working and living conditions, and labor migrations. It was within this a high level of unemployment, and low wages.18 context that the history of the island’s organized labor movement and its Given the prominent role that Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of relationship to the American Federation of Labor unfolded. Labor are acknowledged to have played in the early history of the organized labor From its inception the Federación Libre encountered the hostility of employers movement in Puerto Rico, it is striking that AFL documentary sources have not and local government officials. Workers attempting to form labor unions or been used more extensively and that no studies detailing the AFL’s participation in participating in labor strikes faced tremendous opposition and persecution. that history have been published. Valuable AFL primary sources exist which would be The police often broke up peaceful labor meetings and violently attacked workers helpful in researching the history of the island’s labor movement and its relationship who went on strike. In San Juan, municipal authorities blacklisted labor leaders.20 to the American Federation of Labor. In, “¿Colonialismo sindical o solidaridad During its early years the FLT found itself in a weak political, financial, and internacional?” Félix Ojeda Reyes criticized Puerto Rican scholars for their failure to organizational position. In this context, the Federación Libre sought the solidarity avail themselves of important AFL documents in the United States.19 and support of organized workers in the United States. These primary resources include the following: the Proceedings of the Annual In January of 1900, Santiago Iglesias and Eduardo Conde traveled to the U. S. as Conventions of the American Federation of Labor, for the period from 1899 through the elected representatives of the FLT and made contact with several labor unions and mid-1920s; the American Federationist, the AFL’s official journal, which, over a span of workers’ parties in an effort to obtain their help.21 They had originally intended to nearly thirty years, published many letters, editorials, feature articles, and reports take part as FLT delegates to the Socialist Party convention in Rochester, New York.

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However, they arrived too late to attend that meeting and instead stayed in New to see to it that the workingmen of Porto Rico be accorded full freedom of assembly, York City, where they met with prominent socialist and trade union leaders. Santiago freedom of the press and free speech.”24 From the very beginning of their relation- Iglesias and Eduardo Conde were very well received and feted at numerous labor ship the FLT viewed the American Federation of Labor as an important and meetings and banquets, including one at Cooper Union and another at the Spanish- influential ally that could intercede on its behalf among government officials in speaking cigar-makers union, La Resistencia, in Brooklyn. The Puerto Rican labor order to safeguard the democratic rights of Puerto Rican workers. representatives addressed the New York Central Labor Union on the labor situation Thus, in addition to its political and organizational support, the Federación Libre in Puerto Rico and also spoke to members of the Carpenters’ Local Union Number asked the AFL to help it expose the miserable conditions that prevailed among 309. Everywhere they went they experienced a strong sense of brotherhood and workers in Puerto Rico. Lastly, Iglesias requested the AFL to appoint a commission worker solidarity.22 to visit the island to investigate and report on labor conditions and to help organize Upon his return to Puerto Rico, Iglesias participated in the labor strikes and the 15,000 skilled workers whom Santiago Iglesias claimed would willingly join the demonstrations that followed the change in currency and devaluation of the Puerto American Federation of Labor.25 In his letter, Iglesias also requested Spanish Rican peso stipulated by the Foraker Act of May, 1900. Angry workers protested the translations of the constitutions of the organizations of carpenters, bricklayers, 40 percent increase in the cost of living that resulted when merchants charged the painters, cigar-makers, and tobacco workers in the United States. He wanted these same prices in U.S. dollars that they had previously quoted in pesos, and participated documents for an organizing campaign among workers in Puerto Rico.26 in strikes against low wages. Local government officials arrested Santiago Iglesias on In his memoirs, Santiago Iglesias explained that the FLT appealed to the AFL charges stemming from his part in these protests, and on August 22, 1900, while still for assistance because it believed that workers on the island needed to focus on in prison, Iglesias wrote to various trade unions and socialist organizations in the economic organization and because it did not feel the U.S. Socialist Party was United States requesting moral and financial support for the workers’ movement in adequately prepared to help promote immediate and practical improvements for Puerto Rico.23 the masses of exploited workers on the island.27 This reasoning demonstrates the Later, on September 26, 1900, after his release from jail, Santiago Iglesias once pragmatic attitude of Santiago Iglesias and other FLT leaders and their greater again left Puerto Rico for New York City in order to personally seek the assistance interest in prompt and tangible results rather than socialist ideological issues. of workers in the United States. On December 6th of 1900, while in New York, The American Federation of Labor responded immediately and positively to he wrote to the American Federation of Labor during its annual convention, Santiago Iglesias’ petition. It appointed a “Special Committee on Porto Rico” and asked for its help on behalf of island workers. Iglesias addressed his letter to consider the FLT appeal. The AFL convention then approved this committee’s to “The Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Brother President recommendation that it act on the first two requests and stipulated that in addition and Brethren Delegates.” Specifically, he asked the American Federation of Labor to trade union constitutions, general literature on the need for labor organizations to “recommend to and influence in a decisive manner the public authorities, also be translated into Spanish. It then referred the plea for help in organizing the workers of Puerto Rico to the AFL’s Executive Council.28 The following day, the convention adopted the Executive Council’s further recommendation that AFL unions whose trade was pursued on the island take action to guarantee the workers of Puerto Rico the opportunity to organize and become affiliated to the American Federation of Labor’s national or international trade unions in the United States. In addition, it directed the incoming Executive Council to “take every action possible to comply with the requisition of Santiago Iglesias as contained in his letter” and “authorized [it] to expend a sum not to exceed $3,000 to carry these recommendations into effect.”29 The following year the Federación Libre became affiliated to the American Federation of Labor as a state branch; although not a state, the American Federation of Labor treated Puerto Rico as such. In addition, the AFL appointed Santiago Iglesias as a paid labor organizer in Puerto Rico. The American Federation of Labor went to the aid of the Federación Libre because it viewed Puerto Rico as an integral part of the United States and felt that all the provisions and guarantees of the U.S. Constitution applied to the island. Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor believed that the denial of democratic rights to the people of Puerto Rico represented a potential threat to the constitutional rights of the people of the United States. In 1898, in the wake of the Spanish-Cuban-American War, the military occupation of Cuba, and the annexation of Puerto Rico, Samuel Gompers declared, “it is not difficult to imagine that it is but a step from military rule applied to Cuba to the territory constituting the present Gompers arriving at the Teatro Municipal in San Juan, 1904. To his right is Santiago Iglesias Pant n. United States of America.”30 According to Gompers, “when the Cuban, the Porto Reprinted, by permission, from The George Meany Memorial Archives.

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Rican and the Philippines are deprived of the right to self-government by our ruling FLT offices, and the Federación gained its recognition as a legal entity. Subsequently, class, it is our political rights which are in jeopardy.”31 Thus, the AFL’s interest in all Spanish laws, including labor laws, in conflict with U.S. legislation were declared protecting the rights of Puerto Rican workers was grounded in its desire to protect null and void.38 This became the first of numerous instances that Samuel Gompers the rights of workers in the United States. The AFL also wanted to help organize intervened with high federal and local government officials on behalf of island workers. workers in Puerto Rico lest they become a source of low-wage labor for U.S. industry In defending the rights of workers in Puerto Rico, however, the AFL safeguarded its and thus compete unfairly with American workers. own vital interests. For Samuel Gompers, “the right to organize, and the right which When island government authorities attempted to enforce old Spanish laws logically follows to secure a better return for labor, must be secured for our Porto that declared labor unions and strikes illegal, the American Federation of Labor Rican fellow workers as surely as for those in the United States proper.”39 immediately went to the aid of Puerto Rican workers. On November 9, 1901, after Santiago Iglesias returned to Puerto Rico from his second trip to the United Samuel Gompers in Puerto Rico States, local officials had him arrested. This time, they charged him with contempt In February of 1904 Samuel Gompers undertook the first of the two trips he made of court for failing to appear for the trial to which he had been summoned while in to Puerto Rico during his lifetime; he visited the island a second time in 1914. the U. S. The court set bail at two thousand dollars.32 It later reduced this sum to five Gompers traveled to Puerto Rico in response to Santiago Iglesias’ initial petition to hundred dollars and the AFL provided the bail money, but Iglesias and seven other the AFL and to the subsequent recommendation, made during the Twentieth Annual FLT leaders were subsequently convicted on the charge of conspiring to raise the price Convention of the American Federation of Labor in 1900, that a joint commission of labor. The court then sentenced Iglesias to more than three years in jail and the of AFL unions be appointed to visit the island for the purpose of investigating labor others to lesser terms. It also declared the Federación Libre an illegal organization.33 conditions and to help organize 15,000 skilled Puerto Rican workers.40 In 1902, Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor did not hesitate in going the Twenty Second Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor reiter- to the assistance of Santiago Iglesias and his associates. According to Gompers, ated this recommendation. The AFL’s Executive Council later directed President the union of workers to raise wages had previously been illegal in the United States Gompers to visit Puerto Rico “for the purpose of officially inaugurating the labor because it was considered an effort to restrain competition and trade, but that with movement in said island.”41 Twice Gompers delayed plans for the trip. However, the growth of labor organizations a change in the law had taken place. Gompers empha- in mid-February of 1904 he finally made arrangements to journey to Puerto Rico. sized that some states expressly recognized “the right to co-operate for the purpose A close examination of this visit illustrates the political influence the American of improving the conditions of labor,” and that in others the right was tacitly Federation of Labor and Samuel Gompers attempted to exert on the island’s admitted.34 The legal right to form labor unions and to strike for better pay, organized labor movement. It also reveals his reaction to the many economic and shorter hours of work, and better working conditions constituted the foundation social problems confronted by the people of Puerto Rico, his indignation at the of the labor movement in the United States. For Samuel Gompers there was not a deplorable working and living conditions he encountered among laborers and the single demand of organized labor which did not directly derive from the principle general population, and his thinking on what he believed to be the island’s political that “men may unite to achieve that which one by himself can not achieve, or can relationship to the United States.42 achieve less readily, and which he has a right to achieve.”35 On February 12, 1904, speaking in New York before an audience of old associates The arrest and conviction of Santiago Iglesias, who upon his return to Puerto Rico on the eve of his departure for Puerto Rico, Gompers referred to the workers of the carried with him a commission as a paid organizer for the American Federation of island as brothers of the American workingman to whom the AFL extended the hand Labor and an AFL union charter for the Federación Libre de los Trabajadores de of friendship. Later, shortly after his arrival on the island and following a labor parade Puerto Rico, was understandably perceived as a direct attack on the rights that the organized by the Federación Libre in his honor, Gompers spoke to a large gathering organized labor movement in the United States had struggled so hard and so long to of workers in San Juan and exclaimed that he brought them a “message of fraternity, obtain. In an editorial in the AFL journal the American Federationist, Samuel Gompers solidarity, and brotherhood” from the organized workers of the United States. pointed out that the law under which Santiago Iglesias and the others had been Then, on February 22, 1904, Gompers explained in more detail why he had convicted was a remnant of Spanish legislation in Puerto Rico. Iglesias had been traveled to the island. He went, he stated, to see for himself whether the claims of found guilty of participating in a strike against payment in depreciated Spanish unjust treatment and miserable economic, social, and material conditions made by money, in other words for an increase in wages. “This,” Gompers argued, “can not local labor leaders were true. He pledged that if they were, he would “urge our fellow and ought not be an offense in the United States or any if its possessions in which workman and our fellow citizens to leave no effort untried, no stone unturned, until the authority and constitutional guarantees of our country prevail.”36 justice and fair dealing is assured and secured to every man, woman, and child of In his report to the annual convention of the American Federation of Labor in Porto Rico.”43 1902, Gompers noted that he had met and discussed the matter with President Altogether, Samuel Gompers spent over five weeks on the island. He traveled Theodore Roosevelt and Governor William H. Hunt of Puerto Rico, and that both extensively from one end of Puerto Rico to the other. Riding by horse and had assured him that Iglesias and his colleagues would be granted their rights.37 buggy, Gompers visited San Juan in the northeast and Ponce in the southwest. When Herminio Díaz Navarro, the FLT’s lawyer, appealed the conviction of Iglesias He also stopped over in many smaller cities and towns, including Caguas, Cayey, and the others to the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico, the Court decided in their Mayaguez, San Germán, Arecibo, Sábana Grande, Salinas, Santa Isabel, Guánica, favor and rescinded their sentences. The local government did not close down the Yauco, Arroyo, and Guayama. All over the island, Gompers encountered large

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enthusiastic crowds of working people and participated in a seemingly never- ending succession of labor meeting, assemblies, luncheons, receptions, parades, marches, and rallies. He also received a long stream of greetings, messages, telegrams, and petitions. Over the course of his stay on the island, Gompers met not only with workers and labor representatives, but with businessmen, professionals, and the leaders of various political parties. During his trip to Puerto Rico Samuel Gompers communicated with the Puerto Rican people through an interpreter. Santiago Iglesias, who had learned English during the year he had been in the United States, often served as his translator. The generous welcome he met with everywhere on the island greatly impressed Gompers, and he especially noted how in Salinas, “a family offered to leave their home and turn it over to me for the night. The hospitality of these people,” he remarked, “knows no bounds.”44 At the same time, however, he expressed a paternalistic attitude towards Puerto Ricans. He praised them as worthy of preserving, but cautioned that they would need to acquire the Anglo-Saxon characteristics of punctuality and persistency. However, he noted with confidence that once they did, Puerto Rico would be “an island of one the greatest people of the world.”45 The poverty and misery he encountered everywhere on the island made a deep impression on Gompers. He noted that “in spite of the great fertility of Porto Rico’s soil, a great mass of men are unemployed… poverty very largely abounds and misery and 46 degradation obtain.” He observed that the working people had insufficient food and First section of a parade welcoming Samuel Gompers possibbly at the Plaza de las Delicias in Ponce , 1904. Santiago Iglesias Pant n is at the that their housing accommodations were cramped and unsanitary. “I saw more misery bottom right corner, thrid from right. Reprinted, by permission, from The George Meany Memorial Archives. and hunger stamped upon the faces of the men and women and children in Porto Rico than I have ever seen in all my life, and I hope I may be spared from seeing the like again.”47 and the use of strikes, boycotts, and collective bargaining. It opposed the idea of a labor During his visit, Gompers also commented on the long hours of labor and low party and sought to maintain an apolitical position while rewarding friends and punishing wages of workers on the island. He pointed out that in the sugar refineries the men enemies. Samuel Gompers used his visit to Puerto Rico to promote the basic tenets worked fifteen to sixteen hours for only forty cents per day. At the same time, in the of the American Federation of Labor, particularly the importance of labor unions. sugar plantations laborers cut cane and hauled it for fifteen hours for forty to forty He urged Puerto Rican workers to form labor unions as a way of promoting their five cents per day. The use of company stores where plantation workers were forced demands for steady employment, higher wages, shorter hours of work, and improved to make their purchases also appalled Gompers. He observed that workers paid higher working and living conditions. He told them that the results of organization would be prices for goods of lesser quality than were available elsewhere. However, since employers “to make men more independent and intelligent, to make women more affectionate, paid them in script redeemable only in these establishments, laborers had no loving, and matronly, and to make the children have brighter eyes, brighter hopes, alternative but to make their purchases in these stores. Speaking of the plantation and brighter expectations for the future.”50 This revealed his sexist attitudes as much workers, Gompers remarked that “they are as much bound to the soil as were the as his optimism that workers could realize their aspirations for a better future within serfs in the old-time guilds when the lords and barons held their sway.”48 the existing economic system by simply establishing labor unions. Gompers noted that common laborers earned only thirty cents per day for eleven In addition to stressing the organization of labor, Gompers promoted the unity to twelve hours of work, while skilled workers such as bricklayers and carpenters of the Puerto Rican workers’ movement and its consolidation with the labor earned only from seventy five cents to a dollar twenty five cents per day. Tailors, movement in the United States. His stated purpose in Puerto Rico was to among the most skilled of workers on the island, made twenty five dollars per month, “amalgamate the labor movement into one comprehensive body in full affiliation while cigar-makers had to roll one thousand cigars for payment between three and with the American Federation of Labor.”51 He called for the unification of the two a half to four and a half dollars. Commenting on the work of women, rival Puerto Rican labor federations, the Federación Regional and the Federación Gompers pointed out that on coffee plantations women and girls worked selecting Libre, the two labor groups that grew out of the division of the labor movement coffee in the coffee houses for fourteen to fifteen hours per day for pay of only in June of 1899 over the issue of an alliance between workers and the Partido fifteen to twenty cents. Extensive unemployment also impressed Gompers. Republicano. According to Gompers, divisions among workers only led to more He commented, “I have seen more idle men, more unemployed men, not idle by poverty, hunger, gloom, and despair. He told Puerto Rican workers that “the more choice, but because they can find no work to do, in my travels in Porto Rico than thoroughly you are united the better will be your opportunity for higher wages, for I have ever seen among like numbers of people in all my life.”49 regular employment, for better homes, [and] for sending your children to school.”52 Under his leadership, the American Federation of Labor, organized in 1886, followed Gompers’ effort to unite the Federación Regional and the Federa ción Libre pure and simple trade union politics. It emphasized the organization of trade workers proved unsuccessful. In the end, he concluded that the Federación Regional was

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not a bona fide labor organization, but rather an association of opportunists, members of the American Federation of Labor you surrender no political right you including “politicians in the employment of the government.”53 He pointed out now have.”64 Republicans could remain Republicans and Federalists could remain that the “so-called Federación Regional…was not a labor organization in any Federalists. He only urged that they be true union men and reminded them that sense of the word but a clique which sought to domineer over some workmen while elections took place only once a year, they had to live 364 other days of the in the hope of using them for its own political and personal aggrandizement.”54 year. Gompers claimed that it was more important for workers to have good food However, he continued to advocate in favor of unity between the Federación and better homes.65 Libre de los Trabajadores de Puerto Rico and the American Federation of Labor, The numerical strength, financial power, and political influence of the American which he viewed as representative of the essence of U.S. democratic ideals. Federation of Labor greatly impressed the leaders and rank and file members of the “I convey to you the message of organized labor of the United States, which is labor movement in Puerto Rico. Workers on the island expressed great enthusiasm the living embodiment of the principles of our republic.”55 for the moral and political support the AFL provided them. They also felt that only As far as Samuel Gompers was concerned, the spirit of the Declaration of Samuel Gompers and the AFL could be counted on to effectively and truthfully Independence and the guarantees of the American Constitution, including all the inform the people of the United States and U.S. politicians about the deplorable rights of U.S. citizenship, had to be extended to Puerto Rico. He based this idea on working and social conditions on the island. AFL support encouraged unionized his belief that Puerto Rico formed a part of the United States. This was a recurring workers in Puerto Rico to continue their strike campaigns and organizational efforts theme in Gompers’ pronouncements while on the island. In an address before a large despite their weak numerical and financial position and in the face of the open gathering of FLT workers he stated that “you are now more united to the United hostility of employers and the local government. States than ever before, to all intents and purposes we are one country, so we must Gompers’ 1904 visit to the island greatly increased interest in the establishment have one common interest and one common destiny.”56 However, this view ran of labor unions affiliated to the Federación Libre and the American Federation of counter to the 1901 decision of the United States Supreme Court in the case of Labor. In the wake of his stay in Puerto Rico, the FLT established many new labor Downes v. Bidwell, where it declared Puerto Rico an unincorporated territory of unions and its membership grew significantly. In 1904, there existed forty-three the United States, that it belonged to but was not a part of this country, and that unions in Puerto Rico. By 1909, this number had increased to one hundred and the provisions of the U.S. Constitution did not automatically apply to the island.57 twenty with a total membership of 5500 workers.66 Gompers claimed that his visit The American Federation of Labor also supported U.S. citizenship for Puerto to Puerto Rico had been a huge success. He declared that as a result “the working Rico, and Gompers expressed confidence the U.S. would soon grant such a status. people have become encouraged, and where they were sad and downcast and forlorn In his words, “Porto Rico is now a part of the United States. I know that you are and despairing, they are now hopeful.”67 Following Samuel Gompers’ 1904 visit to entitled to and will receive at an early day the recognition of full American Puerto Rico, the American Federation of Labor continued to provide the Federación citizenship in the United States.”58 Gompers promised to do everything he could to Libre with significant political, financial, and organizational assistance. help secure Puerto Ricans their rights under the United States flag.59 Together with the American Federation of Labor, he worked assiduously to secure U.S. citizenship The American Federation of Labor in Puerto Rico for the people of the island. As a symbol of this effort, President Woodrow Wilson The rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution were of vital importance to the presented Gompers with one of the three pens he used to sign the 1917 Jones Act, American Federation of Labor. Therefore, the AFL constantly campaigned against the major provision of which extended U.S. citizenship to the people of Puerto Rico.60 the violation of these rights in Puerto Rico. As noted earlier, the AFL considered the While on the island, Gompers articulated his belief in the island’s right to full island an integral part of the United States and feared that any infringement of representation in the U.S. Congress and self-rule. He believed that if the people of democratic rights on the island could sooner or later lead to similar violations in the Puerto Rico were good enough to have representation in Spain’s national law-making U.S. mainland. In the aftermath of Samuel Gompers’ trip to Puerto Rico, the American body, “under the star and stripes in free America we ought to accord Porto Rico the Federation of Labor continually supported the protection of these rights on the island. same right and privilege.”61 Gompers expressed outrage that Puerto Rico was treated Specifically, the AFL defended Puerto Rican workers’ rights to form labor unions and to “as a stepchild in the family of Uncle Sam.” He claimed that “the time has come strike for an improvement in labor conditions and an increase in wages, as well as their when not only should Porto Rico be entitled to full fellowship in the family of the rights to freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, and free speech. American republic, but that she should have a full share of home rule.”62 For the Federación Libre the guarantee of these basic democratic rights safeguarded Although he advocated U.S. citizenship and greater self-government for the its survival as a viable labor organization. Many FLT leaders had been active during people of the island, Gompers cautioned Puerto Rican workers against direct the Spanish colonial regime when these political rights did not exist in Puerto Rico. political participation by their labor organizations. This was the official position They knew only too well what it meant to agitate on behalf of the cause of labor in of the American Federation of Labor, and Gompers attempted to impose it on the an environment where advocating labor unions and strikes or speaking and writing island’s organized labor movement. He argued that party politics only served to freely about their beliefs could quickly land them in jail. Prominent FLT leader divide workers. “I know politics and political parties have had much to do with Manuel Francisco Rojas contrasted Spanish and U.S. rule in Puerto Rico and noted dividing the forces of labor in Porto Rico.”63 While acknowledging their right to the oppressive political conditions that existed on the island under Spanish rule. political activity, he implored workers to act on their own responsibility and not to According to Rojas, the people were subjugated to the church and the state without involve labor unions directly in electoral politics. He assured them that “in becoming enjoying the guarantees offered by a government constituted on liberal and democratic

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principles.68 He emphasized that the liberties introduced by the United States created Generally, however, workers in Puerto Rico derived very little by way of financial the conditions that allowed the workers to struggle against capitalist exploitation. support from the American Federation of Labor’s Defense Fund. The AFL’s These included the right to free speech and a free press, the right to assembly and constitutional requirements that strikes be authorized beforehand by the to petition the government for redress of grievances, the right to form labor unions, Federation’s Executive Council, that locals be in continuous good standing for one and the right to strike for better wages and working conditions. In Puerto Rico, year, and that only members who had paid union dues for a full year were eligible for the American Federation of Labor endeavored to secure workers all of these rights. strike benefits often precluded members of the Federación Libre from receiving In 1906, when the police in Puerto Rico brutally attacked workers engaged in a money when they went out on strike. Samuel Gompers’ correspondence with labor peaceful strike and prevented them from meeting, the Federación Libre lodged a leaders in Puerto Rico is replete with instances where he had to explain over and formal complaint with officials of the American Federation of Labor. The AFL then over why striking workers could not get strike benefit payments. For example, lobbied local government officials on its behalf.69 A few years later, another violation on November 12, 1915, Samuel Gompers wrote to Guadalupe Vázquez, the financial of democratic rights took place when a local court sentenced Julio Aybar, the editor secretary of Tobacco Strippers’ Union Number 12502 in Juncos, Puerto Rico, of a labor newspaper, to a prison sentence after charging him with libeling a judge. and urged him to “understand that, under the provisions of Article XIII of the [AFL] Again, the AFL went to the aid of Puerto Rican workers, this time to protect their right Constitution, your organization is not eligible to any benefits from the defense fund, to a free press.70 In 1918, the Governor of Puerto Rico, Arthur Yager, denied striking they having inaugurated a strike without the Executive Council being afforded the workers the right to assemble freely and used the police in his attempt to break the opportunity of considering the matter.”76 The fact that the majority of FLT members strike. Once again Samuel Gompers acted on the workers’ behalf. This time he brought were agricultural laborers subject to very low wages, seasonal work, and high rates the matter directly to the attention of the President of the United States.71 of unemployment and underemployment mitigated compliance with strict AFL In addition to political support, the American Federation of Labor provided Defense Fund requirement. Moreover, because of these economic circumstances, the Federación Libre financial assistance in the form of pay for a full-time labor many local unions and their membership rosters were often unstable. organizer, occasional part-time paid organizers, and participation in the AFL defense In addition to financial support, the AFL also provided organizational help. fund for workers on strike. For a period of almost thirty years, between 1901 and 1929, The American Federation of Labor extended to Puerto Rico its system for Santiago Iglesias functioned as one of the highest paid organizers for the American commissioning volunteer labor organizers. On January 26, 1914, Samuel Gompers Federation of Labor. During this period, Iglesias continually ranked in the top half to wrote to Pascual Jordan in Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico and informed him that top third in pay of all the organizers the AFL employed. For example, in 1919 he earned “in accordance with your request, I am renewing your commission as volunteer $2,233.86 and ranked 32nd in pay out of the 112 organizers the AFL employed that year.72 organizer, which will be sent to you under separate cover.” These volunteers were This reflects the importance the AFL attached to the task of organizing workers in labor union organizers who did not receive a salary for their services. However, Puerto Rico. During most of the period for which he was paid, Iglesias worked while unpaid, these were prestigious and coveted positions conferred by the AFL exclusively in Puerto Rico. For several years in the 1920s he divided his time between president. Because of the official recognition from the AFL hierarchy they entailed, work for the FLT in Puerto Rico and work for the Pan American Labor Federation at positions as volunteer organizers bestowed status on the recipient. Commissioned its headquarters in Washington, D.C. In hiring Santiago Iglesias as a full-time organizer, volunteer organizers provided the FLT with a cadre of middle level leadership. the AFL facilitated the work of one of the island’s most articulate, effective, and charis- The work of these volunteer organizers, together with the efforts of the paid matic labor leaders. Besides Santiago Iglesias, the AFL occasionally deployed other paid organizers, greatly facilitated the organizational growth of the Federación Libre. organizers in Puerto Rico. In the years between 1905 and 1924 nine additional labor Volunteer organizers spearheaded the FLT’s many labor organizing campaigns and organizers received pay from the American Federation of Labor for their work in strike movements. They promoted the benefits of union membership and Puerto Rico. However, the AFL used other paid labor organizers very infrequently and strengthened the Federación Libre by increasing the number of organized workers expended little money on their services. Only Rafael Alonso Torres worked repeatedly in both urban and rural areas throughout the island. They organized skilled workers, for a number of years and received a relatively significant salary. such as cigar-makers, carpenters, and typographers, and unskilled agricultural he AFL also provided financial assistance to FLT members in the form of strike laborers as well. They also organized female tobacco strippers in cigar factories. benefits. Although financial support during strike movements was not an In addition, volunteer organizers actively promoted the use of the union label. T outstanding feature of the AFL’s assistance to the Federación Libre, there were Their organizing methods included the mass circulation of leaflets and pamphlets, numerous instances when the American Federation of Labor did provide significant and the staging of open air public meetings and indoor assemblies in municipal halls, union financial benefits to striking workers in Puerto Rico. In 1906, when seven halls, and theaters. At these gatherings, volunteer organizers explained the principles, ideas, agricultural workers unions, with an average membership of 182, went on strike ends, and benefits of the organized labor movement. They also established organizing in Arecibo for seven weeks, the American Federation of Labor sent them a total of committees and set up series of Saturday and Sunday meetings to recruit new union $5,096 in strike benefit funds.73 In 1913, when Sugar Refinery Workers’ Labor Union members. They often organized forums for the free and open discussion of the economic, Number 12502, with an average membership of about 184, went on strike for three social, industrial, and unemployment problems affecting the workers of Puerto Rico. weeks it received $2,212 from the AFL strike fund.74 And, in 1923, more than three The American Federation of Labor monitored the work of these organizers, and hundred agricultural workers on strike in Guayama, Santa Isabel, and Salinas received they often reported to the leadership. In their reports to AFL officials, volunteer nearly $5000 in benefits.75 organizers made sure to include details about prevailing wages, hours of work,

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and general labor conditions. They also commented on the unemployment situation, Puerto Rican organized labor movement, usually Santiago Iglesias and one or two the persecution of the labor movement, and on the enactment and enforcement of labor other delegates, also presented resolutions for AFL consideration. These resolutions legislation. In addition, they provided information on the state of labor organizations, indicated the kind of assistance the FLT sought from the U.S. labor movement. the chartering of new locals, and on the total number of union members. Volunteer Often they requested political support. organizers often emphasized that unionized workers enjoyed higher wages, shorter hours One major aspect of the FLT’s campaign on behalf of workers in Puerto Rico of labor, and better working conditions than unorganized workers. In this way, together focused on protecting their democratic rights to free speech, a free press, assembly, with the paid organizers, they promoted the concepts and goals of AFL trade unionism. and the right to form labor unions and to strike for better conditions. Many of the Writing from the town of Yauco, one volunteer organizer, Leonardo Pacheco, asserted resolutions brought before AFL conventions by the Puerto Rican delegates asked that “we are striving to create and maintain a perfect trade union organization.”77 for AFL help to guarantee these rights. They often requested that Samuel Gompers From San Juan, Santiago Iglesias informed the AFL in his report that “the workers seem bring to the attention of the U.S. President the violations of democratic rights in enthusiastic to organize and make the labor movement of this island a truly and genuine Puerto Rico. The FLT continually presented resolutions that the AFL demand that American labor movement based upon the best conception of trade union.”78 the national government grant the people of Puerto Rico United States citizenship Active and courageous, volunteer labor organizers led many strike movements and and guarantee them the same rights and privileges as the people of all U.S. states and often confronted the hostility of employers and the police. In his report to the AFL territories. In addition, the FLT promoted its program for social reforms, especially in August of 1905, one volunteer organizer commented that “many employers are in the areas of education and labor, through the resolutions its delegates presented at hostile to organization and this makes our work more difficult.”79 The following year, the annual conventions of the American Federation of Labor. In 1907, FLT delegates another organizer wrote, “organized labor is making progress, but some of the Santiago Iglesias, Eugenio Sánchez, and Joaquín Becerrill presented a resolution that employers are trying to boycott the laborers with the intension of destroying the a joint FLT-AFL committee call on the President of the United States to recommend union.”80 During the agricultural workers’ strike of 1906, authorities arrested that in addition to granting Puerto Ricans U.S. citizenship, school appropriations eleven labor leaders, including a number of volunteer organizers, and accused them and teacher’s salaries be increased, and that laws in favor of the eight-hour work day, of attacking the police.81 Volunteer organizers, nevertheless, remained undeterred. the abolition of convict labor, the abolition of child labor, and the establishment of “The capitalist employers are very antagonistic toward any organization on the part a branch of the Labor Bureau in Puerto Rico also be enacted. The FLT presented of the workers, however, we are going right ahead, trying to improve the working similar resolutions at the AFL convention in 1909 and 1911. Increasingly, over the conditions of the laboring men.”82 course of the 1920s, the Federación Libre focused on the abuses of U.S. absentee One outstanding volunteer organizer who exemplifies the important role these corporations in Puerto Rico. In these efforts the Federación Libre de los mid-level labor leaders played was Esteban Padilla. He was one of the earliest Trabajadores de Puerto Rico could always count on the active support of organized volunteer organizers appointed in Puerto Rico by the American Federation of labor in the United States, as represented by the American Federation of Labor. Labor. Born on December 26, 1878, Padilla became both a tailor and a cigar-maker. In going to the aid of the organized workers’ movement in Puerto Rico, After joining the organized labor movement, Padilla served on the staffs of several the American Federation of Labor provided important political support as well as labor newspapers, including El Provenir Social, El Pan del Pobre, and La Huelga. financial and organizational assistance that contributed to the survival and growth Padilla served as a volunteer organizer in 1904 and 1905 and participated in the great of the Federación Libre de los Trabajadores de Puerto Rico. By 1922, the Federación agricultural workers’ strikes of 1905 and 1906. During those strikes local authorities Libre claimed more than 20,000 members organized in 168 labor unions.84 The most jailed him over thirty times. In 1908, he represented the FLT at the Annual numerous unions included those of skilled workers, such as cigar-makers (sixteen), Convention of the American Federation of Labor in San Francisco and in 1910 carpenters (sixteen), bakers (twelve), and shoemakers (seven). Unskilled cigar helped organize the Partido Obrero Insular. For many years he ran as that party’s factory workers, including many women, also constituted a large number of locals. candidate for a seat in the local legislature. In 1922, Esteban Padilla served as In addition, the FLT reported the existence of twenty-five agricultural workers’ unions. Assistant Chief of the Bureau of Labor in Puerto Rico. Upon his death on January 24, 1927, after a long illness brought on by overwork in a strike in the tobacco Conclusion industry, thousands of mourning workers attended his funeral and paid tribute to his This article demonstrated that Samuel Gompers and the American Federation efforts on behalf of the organized labor movement in Puerto Rico.83 of Labor were not indifferent to the plight of workers in Puerto Rico. The AFL provided In keeping with its view that Puerto Rico was an integral part of the United States them with significant political, financial, and organizational support. It also attempted and the FLT’s charter as a state branch of the American Federation of Labor, the to influence the politics of the Federación Libre de los Trabajadores de Puerto Rico. AFL welcomed Puerto Rican representatives to its conventions. The Federación This article has also shown that while the AFL had selfish motives for going to the aid Libre always sent delegates to the AFL annual conventions, where they participated of island labor, it went to Puerto Rico at the invitation of Santiago Iglesias Pantín and in all deliberations. The FLT availed itself of this participation to highlight labor and the Federación Libre. The AFL’s interest in Puerto Rican workers is an issue that needs social conditions in Puerto Rico and to generate support for the cause of workers on to be investigated further. Nevertheless, Samuel Gompers and the American Federation the island. At these yearly gatherings FLT delegates, Samuel Gompers, the AFL of Labor demonstrated a genuine concern for the plight of workers in Puerto Rico. Executive Committee or the Special Committees on Puerto Rico presented reports The American Federation of Labor’s expressions of solidarity cannot be dismissed highlighting living and working conditions on the island. The representatives of the as solely self-serving. Although strongly motivated by a desire to protect the political

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and economic interests of AFL members and workers in the U. S., it believed that Because of their organizational, political, and financial weakness, as well as Puerto Rico formed an integral part of the United States and consistently persecution at the hands of local employers and government officials, workers on campaigned for U.S. citizenship and statehood for Puerto Rico. In the long run, the island turned to the labor movement in the United States for assistance. The it can be argued that the AFL furthered U.S. efforts to Americanize the island. FLT actively sought the aid of the American Federation of Labor, and Samuel However, in the short term, AFL views on Puerto Rico were often at odds with U.S. Gompers went to Puerto Rico at its invitation. On the island, Gompers and the policy. While the American Federation of Labor favored U.S. citizenship for the American Federation of Labor promoted a conservative trade unionist ideology. people of the island, the United States was opposed to this. However, it cannot be maintained that they imposed trade unionist ideals on the In the Foraker Act of 1900 only “Porto Rican” citizenship for the Puerto Rican Federación Libre. Although the labor movement on the island did have a history people was acknowledged, and not until the Jones Act of 1917 did the U.S. Congress of radical socialist and anarchist influence, it was also influenced by trade confer U.S. citizenship. The AFL also supported incorporated territorial status for unionist thinking. The FLT was, therefore, predisposed to the AFL’s ideology. Puerto Rico, but again the United States was adverse to this. In 1901, the U.S. In addition, from the very beginning, the organized labor movement on the island Supreme Court defined Puerto Rico as an unincorporated territory of the United exhibited a strong faith in a democratic and republican form of government. States. Furthermore, while the AFL proposed self-government and U.S. statehood Its affiliation to the American Federation of Labor reinforced its trust in both for Puerto Rico, the United States refused both of these propositions and has kept trade unionist ideology and U.S. democracy. the island as a colony to this day. The AFL did not have to exert any pressure on the FLT to accept these positions. The Federación Libre did not subserviently follow AFL policies as has been suggested by some. This is most evident in the political stance the FLT took, which was in sharp contrast to that of the American Federation of Labor. The AFL did not believe that workers should organize their own class party and participate NOTES independently in electoral politics. Nevertheless, throughout its history, the FLT 1 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Thirty-Ninth Annual took an active part in electoral politics, both independently and in coalition with Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Atlantic City, New Jersey, June 9–23, other parties. The FLT was not only political, but in 1915 it even organized an official 1919 (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company, 1919), p. 177. workers’ party, the Partido Socialista. Even without the influence of Samuel Gompers 2 Bolívar Pagán, Historia de los partidos pol ticos puertorrique os (San Juan: Campos, 1972), and the American Federation of Labor, an alliance between the FLT and anticolonial Volume I, p. 245. groups in Puerto Rico would have been difficult given the sharp class conflicts that 3 Gordon K. Lewis, Puerto Rico, Freedom and Power in the Caribbean (New York: Monthly existed between workers and the island’s economic and political elite, who were Review Press, 1963), p. 233. 4 leading the call for independence or at least greater autonomy for Puerto Rico. Ibid., p. 236. 5 The Federación Libre favored U.S. citizenship and statehood for Puerto Rico not Ibid., p. 233. 6 Party Politics in Puerto Rico because these ideas were foisted upon it by the AFL, but because the Federación Robert W. Anderson, (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1965), p. 34. Libre believed that it was in its own best interest. 7 Ibid. The history of the FLT and its relationship to the American Federation of Labor 8 Ibid., p. 35. merits further research and analysis. There is now a young generation of labor leaders 9 Blanca Silvestrini, Los Trabajadores y el Partido Socialista 1932 1940 (Río Piedras: on the island who are involved in AFL-affiliated unions and who have a keen interest Editorial Universitaria, 1979), pp. 19–20. in knowing more about the early history of the AFL in Puerto Rico. Moreover, the 10 Arturo Morales Carrión, Puerto Rico, a Political and Cultural History (New York: island’s early twentieth-century labor movement, led by the Federación Libre, is an Norton, 1983), p. 178. example of the kind of radical democratic project to “democratize democracy” that 11 Ibid., p. 179. today is being called for in Puerto Rico. 12 Wilfredo Matos Cintrón, La pol tica y lo pol tico en Puerto Rico (México: Ediciones Era, Further study of the participation of the American Federation of Labor in the 1980), p. 63. early labor movement in Puerto Rico should avail itself of island labor sources. 13 Juan Ángel Silén, Apuntes para la historia del movimiento obrero puertorrique o (Río This would include the memoirs of early labor leaders, the labor press, and the Piedras: Editorial Cultural, 1978), p. 52. proceedings of early labor conventions in Puerto Rico. Caution needs to be 14 Ángel Quintero Rivera, “El Partido Socialista y la lucha triangular de las primeras décadas employed in using Santiago Iglesias Pantín’s Luchas Emancipadoras, where he presents bajo la dominación norteamericana,” Revista de Ciencias Sociales 19, num. 1 (1975): 49–99. the view that he created and defined the course of the island’s early labor movement 15 Gervasio García, “Los orígenes del movimiento obrero en Puerto Rico: mitos y and sought to justify his actions and role as the AFL’s representative in Puerto Rico. problemas” in Historia cr tica, historia sin coartadas, algunos problemas de la historia de Puerto Dissenting voices have to be considered, such as that of Andrés Rodriguez Vera. Rico (Río Piedras: Ediciones Huracán, 1985), p. 82. In addition, AFL motives for going to Puerto Rico need to be examined more closely, 16 Gervasio García and Ángel Quintero Rivera, Desaf o y solidaridad, breve historia del as well as the role that Samuel Gompers and the AFL played in the campaign for U.S. movimiento obrero Puertorrique o (Río Piedras: Ediciones Huracán, 1982), p. 37. citizenship for the Puerto Rican people. 17 Ibid., p. 58.

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18 Francisco A. Scarano, Puerto Rico, cinco siglos de historia (San Juan: McGraw Hill, 1993), 55 Ibid., p. 299. p. 639. 56 Ibid., p. 298. 19 Félix Ojeda Reyes, “¿Colonialismo sindical o solidaridad internacional? Las relaciones 57 José Trías Monje, Puerto Rico, The Trials of the Oldest Colony in the World (New Haven: entre el movimiento obrero puertorriqueño y el norteamericano en los inicios de la Yale University Press, 1997), p. 45. Federación Libre (1899–1901),” Revista de Ciencias Sociales 26, num. 1–4 (1987), p. 314. 58 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, April, 1904, p. 304. 20 Santiago Iglesias Pantín, Luchas emancipadoras, cr nicas de Puerto Rico (San Juan: 1958), 59 Ibid. p. 135. 60 Gonzalo F. Córdova, Resident Commissioner Santiago Iglesias, p. 139. 21 Ibid., p. 136. 61 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, May, 1904, p. 414. 22 Ibid., p. 137. 62 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, April, 1904, p. 303. 23 Ibid., p. 139. 63 Ibid., p. 305. 24 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twentieth Annual Convention 64 Ibid. of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Lousiville, Kentucky, December 6–15, 1900, pp. 65 Ibid. 64–65. 66 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twenty-Ninth Annual 25 Ibid. Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Toronto, Ontario, Canada, November 26 Ibid., p. 65. 8–20, 1909 (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company, 1909), p. 41. 27 Santiago Iglesias, Luchas emancipadoras, p. 199. 67 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, May, 1904, p. 303. 28 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twentieth Annual Convention 68 Manuel Francisco Rojas, Cuatro siglos de ignorancia y serividumbre en Puerto Rico of the American Federation of Labor, 1900, p. 86. (San Juan: Imprenta La Primavera, 1914), p. 16. 29 Ibid., p. 119. 69 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twenty-Sixth Annual 30 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Nineteenth Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Minneapolis, Minnesota, November Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Detroit, Michigan, December 11–20, 16–24, 1906 (Washington, D.C.: The Graphic Arts Printing Company, 1906), p. 16. 1899 (James H. Stone & Company, 1899), p. 16. 70 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twenty-Eighth Annual 31 Ibid., p. 148. Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Denver, Colorado November, 9–21, 32 Santiago Iglesias, Luchas emancipadoras, p. 218. 1908 (Washington, D.C.: The National Tribune Company, 1908), p. 230. 33 Ibid., p. 227. 71 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Thirty-Eighth Annual 34 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, January, 1902, p. 27. Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at St. Paul, Minnesota, June 10–20, 35 Ibid. 1918 (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company, 1918), p. 98. 36 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, March, 1902, p. 72. 72 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Thirty-Ninth Annual 37 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twenty-Second Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Atlantic City, New Jersey, June 9–23, Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at New Orleans, Louisiana, November 1919 (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company, 1919), p. 38 13–22, 1902 (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company, 1902), p. 15. 73 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twenty-Sixth Annual 38 Gonzalo F. Córdova, Resident Commissioner Santiago Iglesias and His Times (Río Piedras: Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Minneapolis, Minnesota, November Editorial de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, 1993), p. 98. 16–24, 1906 (Washington, D.C.: The Graphic Arts Printing Company, 1906), p. 62. 39 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, January, 1902, p. 28. 74 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Thirty-Third Annual 40 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twentieth Annual Convention Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Seattle, Washington, November of the American Federation of Labor, 1900, p. 115. 10–22, 1913 (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company, 1913), p. 40. 41 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Twenty-Second Annual 75 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Forty-Third Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor, 1902, p. 112. Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Portland, Oregon October 1–12, 42 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, April, 1904, p. 318. 1923 (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company), p. 20. 43 Ibid., p. 298. 76 Samuel Gompers Letterbooks 1883 1924, Volume Number 212, Document Number 917, 44 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, May, 1904, p. 393. Columbia University Library Microfilm Collection. 45 Ibid., p. 416. 77 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, February, 1909, p. 179. 46 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, April, 1904, p. 296. 78 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, May, 1907, p. 346. 47 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, May, 1904, p. 413. 79 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, August, 1905, p. 535. 48 Ibid. 80 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, June, 1906, p. 411. 49 Ibid. 81 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, January, 1906, p. 44. 50 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, April, 1904, p. 299. 82 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, May, 1908, p. 402. 51 Ibid., p. 296. 83 American Federation of Labor, American Federationist, April, 1927, p. 496. 52 Ibid., p. 299. 84 American Federation of Labor, Report of Proceedings of the Forty-Second Annual 53 Ibid., p. 415. Convention of the American Federation of Labor, Held at Cincinnati, Ohio, June 12–24, 1922 54 Ibid., p. 394. (Washington, D.C.: The Law Reporter Printing Company, 1922), pp. 160–161.

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