SWOC
Philip Murray was active both in the CIO and in SWOC, the steel worker organizing project.
When the American Federation of Labor ejected the unions which composed the Committee for Industrial Organization (CIO) in 1936, Murray supported Lewis' decision to form a new labor organization. Murray was named a vice president in the new CIO. When the Steel Workers Organizing Committee (SWOC) was formed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on June 7, 1936, Lewis named Murray its chair. Murray oversaw a $500,000 budget and 36 (eventually 200) organizers.
Under Murray, SWOC made a dramatic breakthrough when, on March 2, 1937, it signed a collective bargaining agreement with U.S. Steel. SWOC infiltrated the employer's company unions and turned them against the company, foregoing a traditional organizing campaign.
Murray and SWOC suffered their first defeat when SWOC attempted to organize workers laboring for "Little Steel"—Republic Steel, Bethlehem Steel, Youngstown Sheet and Tube, National Steel, Inland Steel and American Rolling Mills. Employers utilized violence, espionage and large numbers of strikebreakers to defeat the organizing drive.
Murray was elected second vice president of the CIO at its first formal convention in November 1938.
Organizing slowed after the initial burst of success at U.S. Steel. By 1939, SWOC was in debt by $2.5 million. Little Steel continued to strongly resist unionization, and SWOC made few inroads at mills in the Deep South.
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