week 9 BOC

In the United States unionism in some form is almost as old as the nation itself. Crafts that formed local unions in the late 18th and early 19th cent. included printers, carpenters, tailors, and weavers. Their chief purpose was to keep up craft standards and to prevent employers from hiring untrained workers and importing foreign labor. From 1806 there were numerous prosecutions by employers of unions as combinations in restraint of trade. The early 1830s, a period of industrial prosperity and inflation, was a time of union development; however, the financial Panic of 1837 halted this growth. After the Civil War, in 1866, the National Labor Union was formed; it had such objectives as the abolition of convict labor, the establishment of the eight-hour workday, and the restriction of immigration, but it collapsed with its entry into politics in 1872.
-http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/bus/A0861691.html
 In the text above it says that the union is as old as the nation itself and without the union i believe that the united states would not be put together so well and understanding of a system would be lost. The union is a system that was made to make our society go round. Everyone has a responsibility and each different responsibility helps as others do their jobs and everyone is taken care of and is well linked in this sysytem.