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44-549: The Australian Railways Union (ARU) was an Australian trade union in existence from 1920 to 1993. The ARU was an industrial union , representing all types of workers employed in the rail industry, excluding locomotive enginedrivers and tradesmen in craft areas. It was formed in September 1920, through the amalgamation of state-based unions in Queensland , New South Wales , Victoria , South Australia and Tasmania , and

88-627: A big union bent on aggressively forging ahead and compelling shorter hours, more wages and better conditions in and out of the work shop... until the working class is able to take possession and control of the machinery, premises, and materials of production right from the capitalists' hands... Verity Burgmann asserts in Revolutionary industrial unionism that the IWW in Australia provided an alternate form of labour organising, to be contrasted with

132-673: A foreign military occupation can be seen as not meriting the label terrorists because their acts of political violence against military targets of a foreign occupier do not violate international law. Protocol 1 of the Geneva Conventions gives lawful combatant status to those engaging in armed conflicts against alien (or foreign) occupation , colonial domination and racist régimes . Non-uniformed guerrillas also gain combatant status if they carry arms openly during military operations . Protocol 1 does not legitimize attacks on civilians by militants who fall into these categories. In

176-400: A member of formal armed forces engaging in warfare or serving as a combatant . The mass media sometimes uses the term " militant " in the context of terrorism. Journalists sometimes apply the term militant to paramilitary movements using terrorism as a tactic. The mass media also has used the term militant groups or radical militants for terrorist organizations. Those resisting

220-494: A noun, is a person who uses militant methods in pursuit of an objective; the term is not associated with the military. Militant can refer to an individual displaying aggressive behavior or attitudes. Militant is sometimes used as a euphemism for terrorist or armed insurgent . (For more on this, see mass media usage below.) The word "militant" is sometimes used to describe groups that do not name or describe themselves as militants, but that advocate extreme violence . In

264-610: A relationship, in Hoover's opinion, would be a bulwark against the spread of radicalism reflected in the rise of the "Wobblies," the Industrial Workers of the World . The Hoover initiative got no encouragement from those at the meeting. The obstacles that Hoover did not comprehend, [Cyrus] Ching recorded in his memoir, were that Gompers had no standing in the affairs of any company except to the extent that AFL unions had organized

308-534: A world in darkness, almost wholly given over to idolatry." Such religious meaning must not be confused with the word ' belligerent ' used to describe extremist religious behaviours found in some who, based on their extreme religious beliefs or ideologies, take up weapons and become involved in warfare, or who commit acts of violence or terrorism in an attempt to advance their extremist religious agendas. Such extremist groups can be Christian, Muslims, Jewish, or of any other religious affiliation. A militant , as

352-429: Is also organized along the lines of industrial unionism. Marion Dutton Savage associates the spirit of industrial unionism with "the aspiration of workers for the control of industry" inspired by Robert Owen in 1833-34. The Grand National Consolidated Trades Union (GCTU) recruited skilled and unskilled workers from many industries, with membership growing to half a million within a few weeks. Frantic opposition forced

396-487: Is not a violent movement. Militant can mean "vigorously active and aggressive , especially in support of a cause" as in 'militant reformers'. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language , defines militant as "Having a combative character; aggressive, especially in the service of a cause". The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines militant as "aggressively active (as in a cause)". It says that

440-622: Is often used within some religious circles to denote the continuous battle of Christians (as church members) or the Christian Church in their struggle against sin. In particular, the Roman Catholic Church differentiates between Church militant and church triumphant . Ellen G. White , one of the founders of the Seventh-day Adventist church , says "Now the church is militant. Now we are confronted with

484-569: The IWW 's vision was always a totalising vision of a revolutionary society: the Industrial Commonwealth. The theory and practice of industrial unionism is not confined to the western or the English-speaking world. The Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) is committed to reorganizing their current union structure along the lines of industrial unionism. The Congress of South African Trade Unions ( COSATU )

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528-674: The Labourism of the Australian Labor Party and the Bolshevik Communism of the Communist Party of Australia . Revolutionary industrial unionism, for Burgmann, was much like revolutionary syndicalism, but focused much more strongly on the industrial nature of unionism. Burgmann saw Australian syndicalism, particularly anarcho-syndicalism , as focused on mythic small shop organisation. For Burgmann,

572-835: The UN General Assembly Resolution on terrorism (42/159, 7 December 1987). which condemns international terrorism and outlines measures to combat the crime, with one proviso: "that nothing in the present resolution could in any way prejudice the right to self-determination , freedom and independence, as derived from the Charter of the United Nations , of peoples forcibly deprived of that right [...], particularly peoples under colonial and racist regimes and foreign occupation or other forms of colonial domination, nor...the right of these peoples to struggle to this end and to seek and receive support [in accordance with

616-724: The Western Labor Union , soon renamed the American Labor Union , which was the precursor to the IWW. The new organisation was militant in its operations and housed revolutionary socialist and radical ideals, with Boyce proclaiming that labour must "abolish the wage system which is more destructive of human rights and liberty than any other slave system devised." The preamble of the IWW's constitution further emphasised that "There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of working people and

660-758: The militia as a defensive organization against invaders grew out of the Anglo-Saxon fyrd . In times of crisis, the militiaman left his civilian duties and became a soldier until the emergency was over, when he returned to his civilian occupation. The current meaning of militant does not usually refer to a registered soldier: it can be anyone who subscribes to the idea of using vigorous, sometimes extreme, activity to achieve an objective, usually political. A "militant [political] activist" would be expected to be more confrontational and aggressive than an activist not described as militant. Militance may or may not include physical violence , armed combat , terrorism , and

704-558: The president 's authority to assassinate people worldwide who pose an "imminent threat" if "capture is not feasible", the Obama administration routinely called every victim of extrajudicial killing a militant. Among organisations that describe themselves as militants, the Ulster Young Militants are an example of a group resorting to violence (intimidation, arson, and murder) as a deliberate tactic. Militant research

748-750: The railway brotherhoods , but we cannot handle the A.R.U.... We cannot handle Debs. We have got to wipe him out. The General Managers Association turned to the United States government , which immediately sent the United States Army and the United States Marshals to force an end to the strike. In 1905, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) was formed in Chicago at the First Annual Convention of

792-702: The 2000-member UBRE joined the organizing convention of the IWW . Before Herbert Hoover became president, he befriended AFL President Gompers. Hoover, as the former United States Food Administrator, president of the Federated Engineering Societies, and then Secretary of Commerce in the Harding Cabinet in 1921, invited the heads of several "forward-looking" major corporations to meet with him. [Hoover] asked these men why their companies didn't sit down with Gompers and try to work out an amicable relationship with organized labor. Such

836-648: The AFL for a charter, the Scranton Declaration of 1901 was the AFL's guiding principle. Gompers had promised that each trade and craft would have its own union. The Scranton Declaration acknowledged that one affiliate, the United Mine Workers was formed as an industrial union but that other skilled trades—carpenters, machinists, etc. were organized as powerful craft unions. These craft unions refused to allow any encroachment upon their "turf" by

880-498: The AFL's craft unions after the majority of workers in an industry were organized. In the United States , the conception of industrial unionism in the 1920s certainly differed from that of the 1930s, for example. The Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) primarily practiced a form of industrial unionism prior to its 1955 merger with the American Federation of Labor (AFL), which was mostly craft unions. Unions in

924-905: The ARU voted to join in solidarity with the ongoing Pullman Strike , and within hours of the union lending support to the boycott, traffic from the Pullman Company traffic ceased to move from Chicago to the Western United States . The sympathy strike then spread to the Southern and later the Eastern United States. A statement was issued by the chairman of the General Managers Association, which represented railway companies that were mainly situated around Chicago, admitted: We can handle

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968-460: The Australian government that laws were passed which "practically made it a criminal offense to be a member of the I.W.W." Historically, industrial unionism has frequently been associated with the concept of One Big Union . On July 12, 1919, The New England Worker published "The Principle of Industrial Union": The principle on which industrial unionism takes its stand is the recognition of

1012-484: The CIO movement, the AFL established Federal Labor Unions (FLUs), which were local industrial unions affiliated directly with the AFL, a concept initially envisioned in the 1886 AFL Constitution. FLUs were conceived as temporary unions, many of which were organized on an industrial basis. In keeping with the craft concept, FLUs were designed primarily for organizing purposes, with the membership destined to be distributed among

1056-688: The Charter and other principles of international law]." Militants occur across the political spectrum , including racial or religious supremacists , separatists , abortion opponents and proponents, and environmentalists. Examples of left-wing, right-wing, and advocacy group militants include militant reformers, militant feminists, militant animal rights advocates, and militant anarchists. The phrase militant Islam can suggest violent and aggressive political activity by Islamic individuals, groups, movements, or governments. There are also various secret societies that are classified as militant groups. Using

1100-570: The GCTU to collapse after a few months, but the ideals of the movement lingered for a time. After Chartism failed, British unions began to organize only skilled workers, and began to limit their goals in tacit support of the existing organization of industry. A new union movement that was "distinctly class conscious and vaguely Socialistic" began to organize unskilled workers in 1889. Industrial unionism thence proceeded primarily by combining craft unions into industrial formations, rather than through

1144-628: The IWW , six weeks after the formation of the Asiatic Exclusion League . It was created as a rejection of the craft unionism philosophy that the American Federation of Labor endorsed, and from its inception, the IWW would organize without regard to sex, skills, race, creed, or national origin unlike the Federation. It argued for a mass-oriented labour movement, the One Big Union , and declared that "the working class and

1188-613: The IWW from North America. In 1904, the Western Federation of Miners was under significant pressure from military and employer violence in the Colorado Labor Wars . Its labour federation the American Labor Union had not gained significant membership. The AFL was the largest organized labour federation, and the United Brotherhood of Railway Employees (UBRE) felt isolated. When they applied to

1232-660: The birth of new industrial organizations. Industrial organizations prior to 1922 included the National Transport Workers' Federation , the National Union of Railwaymen , and the Miners' Federation of Great Britain . In 1910 Tom Mann went to France and became acquainted with syndicalism . He returned to Britain and helped to organize the Workers' International Industrial Union , which was similar to

1276-670: The calendar; the authorities are making unscrupulous, bitter and frantic attempts to stifle the propaganda of the I.W.W. Brissenden also recorded that: ...several laws have been enacted which have been more or less directly aimed at the Industrial Workers of the World. Australia led off with the "Unlawful Associations Act" passed by the House of Representatives of the Commonwealth in December, 1916... Within three months of

1320-567: The country. The New-York Tribune suggested that the IWW was a German front, responsible for acts of sabotage throughout the nation. Writing in 1919, Paul Brissenden quoted an IWW publication in Sydney, Australia : All the machinery of the capitalist state has been turned against us. Our hall has been raided periodically as a matter of principle, our literature, our papers, pictures, and press have all been confiscated; our members and speakers have been arrested and charged with almost every crime on

1364-444: The divisions that weaken the solidarity of the workers to better their conditions. Revolutionary Industrial Unionism, that is the proposition that all wage workers come together in organization according to industry; the groupings of the workers in each of the big divisions of industry as a whole into local, national, and international industrial unions; all to be interlocked, dovetailed, welded into One Big Union for all wage workers;

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1408-570: The early 21st century, members of groups involved in Islamic terrorism such as Al-Qaeda and ISIS are usually described as militants. Newspapers, magazines, and other information sources may deem militant and guerrilla as neutral terms, whereas terrorist conventionally indicates disapproval of the behavior of the individual or organization so labeled, regardless of the motivations for such behavior, and freedom fighter indicates approval. Militant , at other times, can refer to anyone not

1452-543: The employing class have nothing in common." The critiques of the Federation included the strikebreaking that member unions participated in against each other, jurisdictional squabbling, autocratic leadership , and a strong relationship between union and business leaders in the National Civic Federation . After Debs' six month imprisonment after the ARU's dissolution, he, along with Ed Boyce , Bill Haywood and others, were instrumental in launching

1496-489: The environment. Another usage example includes 'a militant political activist', drawing attention to behaviours typical of those engaged in intensive political activism. The political protests headed by Reverend Al Sharpton have been described as militant in nature in The Washington Post . In general usage, a militant person is a confrontational person who does not necessarily use violence. Militant

1540-642: The few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life. Between these two classes a struggle must go on...." In the United States, IWW executive board officer Frank Little was lynched from a railway trestle. Seventeen Wobblies in Tulsa were beaten by a mob and driven out of town. In the third quarter of 1917, the New York Times ran sixty articles attacking the IWW. The Justice Department launched raids on IWW headquarters across

1584-508: The industrial unionists. The concept came to be known as voluntarism. The federation turned the UBRE down in accord with the voluntarism principle. The Scranton Declaration acknowledging voluntarism was adhered to, even though the craft-based railway brotherhoods had not yet joined the AFL. The AFL was holding the door open for craft unions that might join, and slamming it in the face of the industrial unions who wanted to join. The following year,

1628-544: The like. The Trotskyist Militant group in the United Kingdom published a newspaper, was active in labour disputes, moved resolutions in political meetings, but was not based on violence. The purpose of the Christian Church Militant is to struggle against sin, the devil and ". . . the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places" (Ephesians 6:12), but it

1672-519: The never ending struggle between the employers of labor and the working class. [The industrial union] must educate its members to a complete understanding of the principles and causes underlying every struggle between the two opposing classes. This self-imposed drill, discipline and training will be the methods of the O. B. U. In short the Industrial Union, is bent upon forming one grand united working class organization and doing away with all

1716-679: The passage of the Australian Act, the American States of Minnesota and Idaho passed laws "defining criminal syndicalism and prohibiting the advocacy thereof." In February, 1918, the Montana legislature met in extraordinary session and enacted a similar statute. While Brissenden notes that IWW coal miners in Australia successfully used direct action to free imprisoned strike leaders and to win other demands, Wobbly opposition to conscription during World War I "became so obnoxious" to

1760-487: The perceived limitations of craft unions . Debs himself gave an example of the inadequacies that his fellows at the time felt towards organising by craft. He recounts, that in 1888, a strike was called by train drivers and railway firemen on the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railways, but other employees, particularly conductors , who were organised into a different unions did not join that strike, with strikebreakers brought on to help their employers . In June 1894,

1804-487: The resulting federation, the AFL–CIO , sometimes have a mixture of tendencies. Militant The English word militant is both an adjective and a noun , and it is generally used to mean vigorously active , combative and/or aggressive , especially in support of a cause, as in "militant reformers". It comes from the 15th century Latin " militare " meaning "to serve as a soldier". The related modern concept of

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1848-427: The word militant might typically be used in phrases such as 'militant conservationists' or 'a militant attitude'. An example of the adjective usages is demonstrated when The New York Times ran an article titled Militant Environmentalists Planning Summer Protests to Save Redwoods describing a group that believes in "confrontational demonstrations" and "nonviolent tactics" to get across their message of preserving

1892-535: The workers, and that the federation's focus on craft unionism precluded any effective organization of the mass-production industries by [the AFL's] affiliates. The craft-based AFL had been slow to organize industrial workers, and the federation remained steadfastly committed to craft unionism. This changed in the mid-1930s when, after passage of the National Labor Relations Act , workers began to clamor for union membership. In competition with

1936-634: Was federally registered as a union on 8 February 1921. It merged with three other public transport unions in 1993 to form the Australian Rail Tram & Bus Industry Union . Industrial union Industrial unionism contrasts with craft unionism , which organizes workers along lines of their specific trades. In 1893, the American Railway Union (ARU) was formed in the United States , by Eugene Debs and other railway union leaders, as an industrial union in response to

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