Voted to merge with IAM in July 2005; merger completed by 2012
The Transportation Communications Union (TCU) is the successor to the union formerly known as the Brotherhood of Railway Clerks and includes within it many other organizations, including the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen of America and the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, that have merged with it since 1969.
The union was founded in 1899 by 33 railroad clerks meeting in Sedalia, Missouri, who formed an organization named the "Order of Railroad Clerks of America". The organization renamed itself the "Brotherhood of Railway Clerks", in line with other railway "brotherhoods" of the time. With that name, it took part in the Illinois Central shopmen's strike of 1911.
In 1919, it renamed itself the "Brotherhood of Railway and Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers, Express and Station Employes" to reflect its broadened jurisdiction. From 1928 to 1963, George McGregor Harrison served as its Grand President. In 1967, it changed names again to the "Brotherhood of Railway, Airline, Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers, Express and Station Employes", commonly known as BRAC. Finally, in 1987, after absorbing members from a half dozen other unions that merged with BRAC, the organization adopted its current name.
Merger partners
The Order of Railroad Telegraphers was founded in June 1886 at Cedar Rapids, Iowa. In 1965, the ORT changed its name to the Transportation Communications Employees Union. It merged with BRAC in 1969.
The Railway Patrolmen's International Union represented rail police officers on a number of railroads. RPIU merged with BRAC in 1969 and is now incorporated in its Allied Services Division.
The United Transport Services Employees union was founded in 1937 as the International Brotherhood of Red Caps, representing baggage handlers at railroad stations. A largely African-American union, it was founded with the support of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. It changed its name to UTSE in 1940 and joined the Congress of Industrial Organizations in 1942. The Red Cap and Sky Cap members of UTSE merged with BRAC in 1972 and are also part of its Allied Services Division.
The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters became a part of BRAC in 1978. Founded in 1925 by A. Philip Randolph, the Porters organized for twelve years—largely in secret and in the hostile racial climate of those years—before winning a collective bargaining agreement with the anti-union Pullman Company. BSCP members, including Edgar Nixon, played a significant role in the Civil Rights Movement in the decades that followed. When the Porters merged with BRAC, they formed the Sleeping Car Porters System Division. Today, these and other on-board Amtrak workers are represented by System Division 250.
The American Railway Supervisors Association, later renamed the American Railway and Airway Supervisors Association, was founded on November 14, 1934, by a group of supervisors on the Chicago and North Western Railway. ARASA merged with BRAC in 1980 and continues as a separate Supervisors' Division, operating under its own by-laws, within TCU.
The Western Railway Supervisors Association was founded by a group of Southern Pacific yardmasters who originally organized in 1938, then after joining and splitting from several other yardmasters unions, merged with BRAC in 1983. Its members now constitute System Board 555 and, like other groups within the union, operate under their own by-laws.
History of the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen
The Brotherhood of Railway Carmen was founded on September 9, 1890, in Topeka, Kansas, by railroad employees engaged in the repair and inspection of railroad cars. In the years before merging with TCU, the brotherhood remained active in the realm of organized rail labor. Their main achievement during this era was the amendment of the Railway Retirement Act of 1937, which was signed by President Roosevelt and established a railroad retirement system, separate from the social security program.[1] This act provided an increase in wage of $0.05 an hour, and restored pay rates on Canadian railroads, among other favorable changes.[2]
The union has merged with other railway unions several times. The Brotherhood of Railway Carmen is a division of the Transportation Communications Union. In 1986, the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen voted to merge with the TCU, and members of this craft in the present day are considered a part of the TCU's Carmen Division, which operates by its own by-laws.[3] The most recent merger occurred on January 1, 2012, in which the TCU merged with the International Association of Machinists, after a TCU member vote in July 2005.[4]
The official site of the TCU claims that it all began when seven carmen met at a standing coach at a shop track in Cedar Rapids, Iowa on October 27, 1888, to form the first lodge in the brotherhood. The carmen had grown weary of working seven days a week, 12 hours per day, for $0.10 per hour with no benefits and no representation. The early name of the organization was called the Brotherhood of Railway Car Repairers of North America. The First Annual Convention of the Brotherhood was held in Topeka, Kansas on September 9, 1890. This is where the delegates first drafted its first declaration of principles of the brotherhood and declared that the intent and purpose of the union was to promote friendship, unity, and true brotherly love among its members. At this same convention, the delegates elected William H. Ronemus as Grand Chief Carman (General President), W.S. Missemer as Vice Grand Chief Carman, as well as the first Grand Executive Board.[5]
The Brotherhood of Railway Carmen's objects in the 1930s included "to advance the moral, material, and industrial well-being of its members" and "to secure for our members a just remuneration in exchange for their labor... to shorten the hours of labor as economic development and progress will warrant, eight hours per day is the workday desired, and 44 hours per week, in order that our members may have more opportunities for intellectual development, social enjoyment, and industrial education."[6] In 2013, the Brotherhood Division continues to advocate for similar changes. In the By-Laws of the Division, section six of the preamble states,"... [we unite] to shorten the hours of labor as economic developments and progress will warrant. Six (6) hours per day is the work day desired, and five (5) days per week, thirty (30) days annual vacation, in order that our members may have more opportunities for intellectual development, social enjoyment and industrial education."[7]
Brotherhood groups in the United States have been prominent and widespread throughout the history of labor organizations. Other important societies include the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, the Brotherhood of Railroad Trackmen, the Switchmen's Union of North America, and the Order of Railroad Telegraphers. These brotherhoods have similar objects which are partly social and educational. Their chief aim is the improvement of the industrial status of their members and the promotion of their economic interests as employees. They arrange wage schedules, and make arrangements about overtime, and they secure both life and disability insurance.[8]
TCU today
Arthur Maratea currently serves as National President of the Transportation Communications Union (TCU/IAM). Maratea began his career as a carman on Long Island Railroad in 1989, and later worked several railroad jobs as a telegrapher and block operator. Maratea formerly served as National Vice President & Special Assistant to the President.
Maratea succeeded Robert A. Scardelletti after his retirement on July 31, 2020. Scardelletti retired after serving a historic 29 years as President.[9] TCU's headquarters are in Rockville, Maryland.
Nixson Denton, History of The Brotherhood of Railway & Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers, Express and Station Employees. Cincinnati, OH: George M. Harrison Biographical Committee, 1965.
The American Railway Union (ARU) was briefly among the largest labor unions of its time and one of the first industrial unions in the United States. Launched at a meeting held in Chicago in February 1893, the ARU won an early victory in a strike on the Great Northern Railroad in the summer of 1894. This successful strike was followed by the bitter 1894 Pullman Strike in which government troops and the power of the judiciary were enlisted against the ARU, ending with the jailing of the union's leadership for six months in 1895 and effectively crushing the organization. The group's blacklisted and dispirited remnants finally disbanded the organization via amalgamation into the Social Democracy of America (SDA) at its founding convention in June 1897.
Founded in 1925, The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters and Maids, commonly referred to as the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (BSCP), was the first labor organization led by African Americans to receive a charter in the American Federation of Labor (AFL). The BSCP gathered a membership of 18,000 passenger railway workers across Canada, Mexico, and the United States.
The railroad brotherhoods are labor unions of railroad workers in the United States. They first appeared in 1863 and they are still active. Until recent years they were largely independent of each other and of the American Federation of Labor.
The Order of Railroad Telegraphers (ORT) was a United States labor union established in the late nineteenth century to promote the interests of telegraph operators working for the railroads.
The Commercial Telegraphers Union of America (CTUA) was a United States labor union formed to promote the interests of commercial telegraph operators.
Railway Labor Executives' Association (RLEA) was a federation of rail transport labor unions in the United States and Canada. It was founded in 1926 with the purpose of acting as a legislative lobbying and policy advisory body. At times, it played a prominent role in setting rail transport policy in the U.S., and was party to six U.S. Supreme Court cases. It disbanded in January 1997, with representation, collective bargaining, and legislative lobbying assumed by the newly formed Rail Division of the AFL–CIO Transportation Trades Department.
The Brotherhood Railway Carmen of America, commonly known as the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen (BRC), was a fraternal benefit society and trade union established in the United States of America. The BRC united railroad employees involved in the repair and inspection of railroad cars to advance their common interests in the realm of hours of work, wages, and working conditions.
The Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen (BRT) was a labor organization for railroad employees founded in 1883. Originally called the Brotherhood of Railroad Brakemen, its purpose was to negotiate contracts with railroad management and to provide insurance for members.
The Order of Railway Conductors of America (ORC) was a labor union that represented train conductors in the United States. It has its origins in the Conductors Union founded in 1868. Later it extended membership to brakemen. In 1969 the ORC merged with three other unions to form the United Transportation Union.
The Order of Sleeping Car Conductors (OSCC) was a labor union that represented white sleeping car conductors in the United States and Canada between 1918 and 1942, when it merged with the Order of Railway Conductors.
The United Brotherhood of Railway Employees (UBRE) was an industrial labor union established in Canada in 1898, and a separate union established in Oregon in 1901. The two combined in 1902. The union signed up lesser-skilled railway clerks and laborers, but had the ambition of representing all railway workers regardless of trade. The Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) was determined to break the UBRE and provoked a major strike in Vancouver in 1903. The CPR used strikebreakers, spies and secret police to break the strike. The crafts brotherhoods of engineers, conductors, firemen and brakemen would not support the UBRE. The strike failed, and the UBRE disintegrated over the next year.
The following is a timeline of the history of labour organizations in communities in and around Greater Sudbury, Ontario, Canada. Listings for incorporated townships which were later amalgamated with the City of Sudbury are noted separately.
Willard Saxby Townsend was an African-American labour leader. He worked to improve the working conditions of African-American baggage handlers in railroad terminals, and was the first African-American to serve as Vice President of the Congress of Industrial Organizations. He was inducted into the National Railroad Hall of Fame.
George McGregor Harrison was an American leader of organized labor who built the Brotherhood of Railway & Steamship Clerks, Freight Handlers, Express & Station Employes into one of the "largest and best-governed". labor unions in American history during his tenure. Throughout his thirty-five years as Grand President (1928–1963), the Harrison administration and the Brotherhood remained above "suspicion and reproach". He served as an advisor to five American presidents and played a pivotal role in drafting the first Social Security measure that was enacted by Congress.
The United Transport Service Employees of America (UTSEA) was a labor union representing railroad workers, principally station porters, in the United States.
Robert Attillio Scardelletti is a retired American labor union leader.
Charles Leslie "Les" Dennis was an American labor union leader.
Richard Ignatius Kilroy was an American labor union leader.
Arthur Maratea is an American labor union leader.
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