The Mine Workers
Brophy was born in Lancashire, England to a family of miners. His family emigrated to the United States when he was nine years old and found work in the central Pennsylvania coal mines. Brophy began working in the mines at age eleven; by the age of fourteen, he had joined the UMWA. He rose within the union to become president of District 2 of the UMWA.
Brophy ran against Lewis for President of the UMWA in 1926 on a "Save the Union" slate, calling for nationalization of the coal industry. He probably would have won the election if the vote had been held democratically.
Lewis drove Brophy and his supporters from the union after his victory in 1926. More specifically Lewis accused Brophy of dual unionism, based on the support that he had received from the Trade Union Educational League, an arm of the Communist Party which had supported his candidacy. The CPUSA later burned its bridges with Brophy, denouncing him as a reformist, after it adopted a policy of opposition to mainstream unions during the "Third Period".
Brophy was a self-educated man, who spent his time after Lewis' expelled him from the UMWA studying economics and philosophy. He was also deeply religious, relying on "Rerum Novarum", the papal encyclical of Pope Leo XIII supporting the right of workers to form unions, as the bridge between his faith and his commitment to the rights of workers.
Read more about this topic: John Brophy (labor)
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