The International Fur and Leather Workers Union (IFLWU), was a labor union

Trade union

A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...

 that represented workers in the fur and leather trades. The IFLWU was founded in 1913 and affiliated with the American Federation of Labor

American Federation of Labor

The American Federation of Labor was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States. It was founded in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions disaffected from the Knights of Labor, a national labor association. Samuel Gompers was elected president of the Federation at its...

 (AFL).

Radical union organizers, including Communists

Communists in the U.S. Labor Movement (1919-1937)

The Communist Party and its allies played an important role in the United States labor movement, particularly in the 1930s and 1940s, but never succeeded, with rare exceptions, either in bringing the labor movement around to its agenda or in converting their influence in any particular union into...

, played a role in the union from its early years. One radical and long-time dissident, Ben Gold

Ben Gold

Benjamin Gold was an American labor leader who was prosecuted for his communist political views under McCarthyism. He was president of the International Fur and Leather Workers Union from 1937 to 1955.-Early life:...

, became union president in 1935.

In 1937, the IFLWU left the AFL and joined the new Congress of Industrial Organizations

Congress of Industrial Organizations

The Congress of Industrial Organizations, or CIO, proposed by John L. Lewis in 1932, was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 required union leaders to swear that they were not...

 (CIO), led by John L. Lewis

John L. Lewis

John Llewellyn Lewis was an American leader of organized labor who served as president of the United Mine Workers of America from 1920 to 1960...

. Between 1949 and 1950, with Cold War

Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

 tensions rising, the CIO expelled the IFLWU and 10 other unions that it accused of being "communist dominated

Communists in the U.S. Labor Movement (1937-1950)

The Communist Party and its allies played an important role in the United States labor movement, particularly in the 1930s and 1940s, but never succeeded, with rare exceptions, either in bringing the labor movement around to its agenda or in converting their influence in any particular union into...

."

In 1955, the union dissolved into the Amalgamated Meat Cutters

Amalgamated Meat Cutters

The Amalgamated Meat Cutters , officially the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America, was a labor union that represented retail butchers and packinghouse workers.-History:...

union.

External links

• Records of the IFLWU (Cornell University)

Further reading

• Steve Rosswurm, The CIO's Left-Led Unions (Rutgers University Press, 1992), pp. 159–181.