The Forgotten Women of the 1887 Labor Convention
A rare glimpse of women organizers taking the floor at an early Seattle-area political gathering, challenging the 'monopolists' of the Gilded Age.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
At the first convention of the new labor party held in Seattle, the most striking feature of the delegations was the presence of ten lady members. They took seats among the delegates of their respective states and appeared to be quite at home. At the afternoon session, the number of delegates was much smaller, but Mrs. Martin Todd of Michigan addressed the convention. She spoke to the working men, saying that if the words of James G. Blaine were true, there was no need for this convention. She argued that the workingman, with the ballot in his hand, had been disenfranchised by the machinations of monopolists and the gross evils of the wage system. She declared that under the current system, the workingman might be a slave on free land, and made a fervent appeal for an immediate and harmonious organization of all laboring men, warning that factions had previously split every effort at union. Mrs. Todd concluded her address to intense gratification and a unanimous vote of thanks.
“The workingman, with the ballot in his hand, had been disenfranchised by the machinations of the monopolists and by the gross evils of the wage system.”
This 1887 report captures a moment when organized labor was still experimenting with inclusion, long before the 'business unionism' of the 20th century. Today's labor resurgence in Seattle—often led by women and precarious workers—rhymes with Mrs. Todd's call to organize against concentrated corporate power.
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