Two distinct phases can be seen in the history of the _Internationale_
in America. During the first phase, which began in 1866 and lasted until
1870, the _Internationale_ had no important organization of its own on
American soil, but tried to establish itself through affiliation with
the National Labor Union. The inducement held out to the latter was of a
practical nature, the international regulation of immigration. During
the second phase the _Internationale_ had its "sections" in nearly every
large city of the country, centering in New York and Chicago, and the
practical trade union part of its work receded before its activity on
behalf of the propaganda of socialism.
These "sections," with a maximum membership which probably never
exceeded a thousand, nearly all foreigners, became a preparatory school
in trade union leadership for many of the later organizers and leaders
of the American Federation of Labor: for example, Adolph Strasser, the
German cigar maker, whose organization became the new model in trade
unionism, and P.J. McGuire, the American-born carpenter, who founded the
Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and who was for many years the
secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Labor.
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