Международная ассоциация машинистов и работников авиационной промышленности

North American trade union

The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) is an AFL–CIO/CLC trade union representing approx. 646,933 workers as of 2006 in more than 200 industries with most of its membership in the United States and Canada.

On May 5, 1888, Thomas W. Talbot, a railroad machinist in Atlanta, Georgia, founded the Order of United Machinists and Mechanical Engineers. Talbot and 18 others had been members in the Knights of Labor. Talbot believed that a union needed to be formed for railroad machinists that would resist wage cuts. He wanted to provide insurance against unemployment, illness, and accidents but also wanted railroad machinists to be recognized for their craft skill. Unlike the Knights of Labor, who accepted everyone, Talbot's union accepted only white US citizens, preferably native born. The union excluded blacks, women, and non citizens, and had secret passwords. Despite the secrecy, the order spread beyond Georgia, thanks in part to "boomers", men who traveled the railway lines for work. These boomers established local lodges in new areas. Within one year there were 40 lodges, and by 1891, there were 189. On May 6, 1889, the Machinists held their first major convention in Atlanta. Talbot was elected the Grand Master Machinist (later known as the international president), and William L. Dawley was elected as Grand Secretary (now known as General Secretary Treasurer). The Organization's name was changed to the National Association of Machinists (NAM) and a constitution was drawn up. The NAM began publishing the 16 page Machinists Monthly Journal. Also in 1889, Frank French designed an emblem for the union. The emblem consisted of a flywheel, a friction joint caliper, and a machinist's square with the initials of the organization. According to French, the flywheel represented the ongoing power of the union once it started, and the caliper signified an extended invitation to all persons of civilized countries. The square signified that IAM was square and honest. In 1890 and 1891, NAM reached Canada, making Canadians the first international members. Locals were also formed in Mexico. To reflect this, in 1891 the name was changed from National Association of Machinists to International Association of Machinists (IAM), at a conference in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 1892, IAM signed a contract with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, establishing the first organized shop at a railroad in the United States. Because IAM had a color bar, the American Federation of Labor (AFL) did not accept IAM right away. After IAM finally did join the AFL, AFL President Samuel Gompers urged IAM to drop its whites only rule. But IAM maintained racial segregation, arguing that it needed to retain southern members. IAM chief Talbot's wanted the union to be a fraternity of white men born in the United States who possessed good moral character. Though the AFL president urged the dropping of the color bar, member unions routinely discriminated against black workers through racial exclusion policies on the local level which the AFL rarely commented on.

The Machinists' membership reached 300,000 during World War I which at the time made it the largest union in 1918. As the war ended and wartime production came to an end membership dropped to 80,000 in 1923. Membership declined in 1933 to only 50,000 due to the effects of the Great Depression. Of those 50,000 members, 23,000 workers were unemployed. In 1935 the machinists started to organize with the airline industry. In 1936, the Boeing Company in Seattle, Washington, signed the industry's first labor agreement. By 1938, the IAM negotiated the first union agreement in air transportation with Eastern Air Lines. In 1944 IAM union members established an education department to publish a supplemental journal. This journal would be published weekly by The Machinist the IAM newspaper. Eventually the journal's production was cut back to twice a year and was voted out of existence in 1956. It was replaced with a quarterly magazine entitled The IAMW Journal.

The break was over a failure of the AFL to settle a jurisdictional dispute between IAM and the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America as well as the Amalgamated Association of Street and Electric Railway Employees of America. IAM disaffiliated with the AFL in 1945. In 1947 Congress passed the Taft Hartley Act, officially known as the Labor Management Relations Act, which placed restrictions on union activities. This act also contained provisions that made closed shops illegal and outlawed boycotts. The second section of the Taft Hartley Act was controversial because it allowed states to pass right to work laws, which enabled them to regulate the number of union shops. Furthermore, the machinists worked with AFL unions to repeal the act. The limitations imposed on union political activity by this act led to the creation of the Machinists' Non Partisan Political League. In 1948, Lodge 751 went on strike against the Boeing Company in Seattle, Washington. The machinists preserved longstanding seniority rules that the company wanted to abolish and achieved a 10 percent per hour raise. IAM also competed for members with the United Auto Workers of America in the automotive industry and with the United Aerospace Workers for aircraft working in that union. In 1949, IAM signed no raiding agreements with both unions. Those agreements become the model for other unions when AFL and the CIO merged in 1955.