In this important new book, Melvyn Dubofsky traces the relationship between the American labor movement and
the federal government from the 1870's until the present. His is the only book to focus specifically on the "labor
questions" as a lens through which to view more clearly the basic political, economic, and social forces that
have divided citizens throughout the industrial era. Dubofsky integrates archival and other traditional historical
sources with the best of recent scholarship in history and the social sciences to show that the government has
had an exceptional influence on workers and their movements in the United States. Many scholars contend that the
state has acted to suppress trade union autonomy and democracy, as well as rank-and-file militancy, in the interests
of social stability and conclude that the law has rendered unions the servants of capital and the state. In contrast,
Dubofsky argues that the relationship between the state and labor is far more complex and that workers and their
unions have gained from positive state intervention at particular junctures in American history. He focuses on
six such periods: the turn of the century, when trade unions nearly quintupled in size; the World War I years,
when they nearly doubled their memberships; the New Deal period, when organizers rebuilt a moribund labor movement;
the World War II years, when mass production matured and the so-called modern industrial relations system developed:
the Korean War period, when unionism reached its maximum strength among American workers; and the years of Lyndon
B. Johnson's Great Society, the last period when union membership increased in size. Dubofsky argues that these
were eras when, in varying combinations, popular politics, administrative policy formation, and union influence
on the legislative and executive branches operated to promote stability by furthering the interests of workers
and their organizations.