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Jacob Lawrence Cohen was a prominent Canadian labour and civil rights lawyer in the 1930's and 1940's. Cohen was instrumental in negotiating a number of landmark labour disputes that helped pioneer legislation in Canada. He also defended a number of trade unionists, many of whom were Communist, imprisoned under the War Measures Act. His staunch defense of society's underdogs brought him a great deal of respect and notoriety. Cohen's career reflected many of the tensions of Canadian society in the period. The growth of industrial unionism, the development of progressive labour legislation and a growing fear of Communism, all touched him professionally and personally. His brilliant career ended abruptly in 1946 after his conviction of assault. His trial raises a number of questions about the judicial system. After a four year struggle in the courts, Cohen's law practice resumed in 1950 but he failed to regain his former prominence. He died in May 1950. J.L. Cohen had a great impact in developing and fighting for progressive labour laws to deal with the changing society of the 1930's and the 1940's. He was in the centre of a turbulent period in Canadian history as counsel in diverse and unpopular legal cases. Many of his struggles helped legitimize the aspirations of the labour movement and develop the legal and jurisdictional regulations that govern all trade unions today.

The focus of this thesis is the Liberal government's program of mandatory wage and price controls introduced on October 14, 1975. Beginning with a brief discussion of the marxist theory of the state, the thesis examines prior experiences with wage restraint programs, the evolution of post-war industrial relations, and the emergence of symptoms of economic crisis toward the end of the 1960's. Thereafter it considers the progress of state efforts to introduce wage/ price restraint, the social forces which shaped the pattern of state intervention, the actual operations of the Anti-Inflation Board, and the character of organised labour's opposition to compulsory controls. The thesis argues that state intervention into the sphere of wage bargaining is one concrete example of the deeper contradictions which lie at the basis of the state structure. With the end of the long boom of post-war expansion, the underlying tendencies toward a crisis of capital accumulation became manifest. The deteriorating effectiveness of established techniques of economic management, and the failure of the Liberal government to develop a coherent program of capitalist planning set the immediate context for the program of wage and price controls. The objective of controls was to restrict the rate of wage increases, thereby easing the downward trend in profit levels and relaxing the fiscal crisis of the state. The record of the Anti-Inflation Board revealed two general characteristics of the current economic and social crisis. First, the capitalist state is virtually powerless to exercise any influence over the long term pattern of inflation and slump. At the present stage of capitalism, attempts to plan economic development simply exacerbate the inherent anarchy of capitalist production. Second, the weakness of organised labour's opposition to controls indicates the urgent necessity for a restructuring of the economic and political organisation of the working class in order to defend the economic and social gains of the postwar period.

During the Depression Canadian workers faced a series of assaults on their wages and working conditions. Threatened by shrinking markets, Canadian employers moved to reduce labour costs. When the Canadian Western Lumber Company at Fraser Mills, B.C., attempted to follow the pattern being set throughout the Canadian economy, the millworkers went out on strike. Lasting for two and half months, the labour protest by the millworkers and their families ended in success. The success of the 1931 strike stands in sharp contrat to the generally abysmal performance of organized labour during the thirties. The strength of this particular protest was derived from two totally unrelated factors. The strike was led by the militant Lumber Workers' Industrial Union, an affiliate of the Workers' Unity League. During the thirtiees the Workers' Unity League was one of the most dynamic labour organizations in Canada. The real strength of the protest, however, lay in features to the community. The worker community of Maillardville/Fraser Mills was remarkably stable and socially cohesive. This was largely due to the existence of a persistant, tightly organized community of French-Canadian workers. The workforce at Fraser Mills had a well-defined associational network which not only faciliated organization prior to the strike but also ensured its success once the strike was underway. This study of the Fraser Mills strike of 1931 analyzes the relationship between labour protest and the community from which it emerged.

This study of CAIMAW's history attempts to explain why some Canadians in recent times have abandoned international unions to found and develop an independent Canadian union, to determine whether such an independent union is identifiably different from those unions traditionally operating in Canada, and to identify the factors that operate in favour and mitigate against the success of Canadians in their attempt to create and develop such a union. Personal interviews with the major figures related to this study comprise an essential source of information. Due to the cooperation extended by CAIMAW, a search of union files was conducted and constitutions, pamphlets, correspondence, newspaper articles, union publications and other relevant documents were examined. Published sources provided secondary information for the majority of this paper. A societal mood in the 1960's of labour militancy, uncertainty arising from adaptation to change, a desire for Canadian self-assertion, and a corresponding resentment of American influence in Canadian affairs combined to set the stage for the formation of breakaway independent Canadian unions in Winnipeg and Vancouver. Lack of control over their own affairs and the imposition on the membership of unpopular union decisions by international officers created unrest among these Winnipeg and Vancouver workers, and a demand for greater membership decision making authority. Refusal by the international unions involved to respond to this demand resulted in a coalition of union dissidents and nationalists in a common cause, the rejection of their international unions and the founding of their own, independent national unions. The merger of the Winnipeg and Vancouver breakaway unions gave rise to a constitutional battle seated in philosophical differences with overtones of regionalism. It was a struggle between business unionism and social unionism, and a corresponding struggle between centralized authority and local autonomy. The resolution of this struggle in the rejection of business unionism and centralized authority laid the foundations for the policies and practices of CAIMAW as it operates today. These policies and practices make CAIMAW a union that is identifiably different from traditional international unions in terms of greater decision-making power for the rank and file, different methods of bargaining, and a different organizational structure. These differences do not, however, appear to have hindered CAIMAW's ability to win benefits for its membership that are at least comparable to those won by international unions. An independent union such as CAIMAW faces difficulties in its formation and development due to the established place of international unions in Canadian labour institutions. But weaknesses within these institutions such as interunion and intraunion divisions have allowed CAIMAW to survive and, indeed, grow. CAIMAW can draw support from union dissidents, nationalists and socialists of the New Left, groups which traditional labour institutions in Canada have failed to accommodate. To the extent that a society creates institutions in accordance with its needs, there exists an important place for CAIMAW in Canada.

This study sought to determine whether the St. Lawrence-Richelieu Teachers' Association (SRTA) was a union or a professional association. The question was tackled by subjecting the SRTA to various definitions of unionism and professionalism, and by examining the operational behaviour of the teacher organization in recent years. It was found that with respect to the definitions of the terms established in the thesis the SRTA cannot be called a union or a professional association per se. However, although the organization has exhibited traits of unionism and/or professionalism throughout its evolution, it is clear that the SRTA is today closer to a union than to a professional association.

Farm labourers formed an important segment of the agricultural work force in Alberta betweeen 1880 and 1930. The work they performed was arduous, poorly paid and insecure, but was accepted by most as a necessary first step toward farm ownership. During the early years of settlement, the perception of farm labour as an apprenticeship was confirmed by the ready availability of agricultural land. But settlement expansion in the years before the First World War greatly reduced opportunities for farm ownership, leading to a redefinition of hired workers. By the 1920s, they were no longer farm apprentices but an agricultural proletariat. At the same time, rapid agricultural development and a number of social and economic changes led to a relative decline in their working and living conditions. There was almost no attempt by farm workers to resist these changes. Despite their importance within the agricultural work force, a number of formal and informal constraints made it difficult for them to challenge their deteriorating position. Hampered by isolation, economic pressures and government controls, farm workers were above all restrained by their own inability to recognize that the perception of their position as farm apprentices was no longer valid.

This thesis is the study of class relations within a dependent capitalist environment. Upon defining the conceptual and geographical basis for this study, an explanatory framework is advanced which borrows from C.B. Macpherson and the work of numerous theorists of the dependency school. A detailed historical analysis of the external structures of domination, the corporation and the trade union, the internal dynamics of social change, and the dominated class of the petite bourgeoisie and the working class, is offered. In the process of our analysis, an alternate interpretation for the rise of Social Credit in Quebec during the 1960s is offered.

This study traces the development of the collective bargaining process for teaching personnel tram 1964 to 1969 in the Protestant Education System of Quebec and describes the effects that this development had on the Quebec Association of Protestant School Boards (QAPSB) and the Provincial Association of Protestant Teachers of Quebec (PAPT). The study includes an analysis of certain sections of the Education Act and other legislation sanctioned by Quebec's Legislative Assembly dealing with the collective bargaining process as it relates to school boards and teachers. The following questions are addressed in this study: 1) to what extent did the Government of Quebec change its participation in the process of determining conditions of employment for teachers during the period from 1964 to 1969; 2) in what respects did the QAPSB and PAPT redefine their respective approaches to the establishment of conditions of employment for teachers; 3) what aspects did QAPSB and PAPT reorganize internally and to what degree did they establish formaI liason between themselves and their Roman Catholic counterparts at the Provincial level?

This thesis examines the labour market experience of Chinese post-war immigrants in Montreal's ethnic and general labour markets. It provides empirical information on the Chinese ethnic labour market in Montreal and assesses the theoretical relevance of the distinction of an ethnic labour market from the general labour market for the understanding of the socio-economic attainment of immigrants in Canada. The findings reveal significant segmental differences in the composition of the labour force, employment characteristics, mobility patterns, and monetary returns to human capital investment. These indicate the distinctiveness of the ethnic labour market and provide support for Wiley's (1968) thesis of the ethnic mobility trap. Theoretical implications of these findings for studies of occupational achievements of immigrants in Canada are discussed.

Recent attempts to extend Marx's analysis of capitalism by developing a class-based theory of the role and functions of the capitalist state have turned on the debate between the "instrumentalist" and "structuralist" perspectives. Subsequent critiques and extensions of these two conceptions of the relations between the state and the major classes within capitalist society have raised the issues of the role of class struggle in the development of state structure and policy as well as the impact of the capitalists state itself on the nature of class relations. Although theorists have pointed to the mutually conditioning effects characterizing the relationship between the state and social classes, there has bee little empirical examination of this relationship. The precise nature of the kinds of mechanisms linking various social classes and the state together with the concrete effects of these links on state and class relations required further specification. In response to this significant gap in the development of the theory of the capitalist state, the present research was formulated to address the issue of specifying the forms of mediation between the state, industrial capitalists and labour through an analysis of the history of maximum hours, minimum wage, and workmen's compensation legislation in Ontario between 1900 and 1939. These areas of legislation were chosen because of their significance, for both capitalists and workers; they represent a potential drain on accumulated surplus for owners of capital and a potential improvement in subsistence and working conditions for labour. The development of legislation in each of these areas thus provided a focus for examining relations between owners of industrial capital, wage labour, and the state. The major sources of data for the primary analysis covering the period from 1900 to 1939 consisted of private papers, published and unpublished government documents located in the Public Archives of Ontario and the Public Archives of Canada, labour newspapers, and the journal of the Canadian Manufacturers' Association. The analysis of relations between workers, employers, and the state around limitations on working hours, minimum wage regulation, and the establishment of a workmen's compensation program identifies a number of modes by which capitalist domination in the workplace is mediated to the level of political relations. These modes of mediation function through mutually reinforcing economic, political and ideological forms and have as their primary effect the frustration of the political organization of labour as a class. Capitalist modes of mediation are parallelled and supported by the modes of mediation adopted by the state in its role of managing class relations. In the process of the development of the areas of legislation which are the focus of this study, the state functioned to maintain the hegemony of capitalist social relations of production by transforming the economic class struggle and processing labour demands in such a way that subsequent state policy and structure were guided in the direction of comparability with prevailing class relations of domination and subordination.

Throughout its history the Newfoundland Federation of Labour has pursued two primary goals - to spread trade union organization and to lobby government to adopt legislation favourable to the interests of working people. The degree to which the Federation has been successful has depended upon the quality and dedication of its leadership, economic conditions and the willingness of government to be influenced. An unstable, rural economy delayed the emergence of a Newfoundland Labour Movement until the mid-1930s. Once it did emerge, however, Newfoundland workers responded enthusiastically. The NFL's founding meeting in 1937 at Grand Falls was followed by a country-wide organizing drive. Despite a six year lull caused by World War II, by the late 1940s the Newfoundland labour force was the most highly operated in North America. Unlike their counterparts in Britain, however, Newfoundland trade unionists were unable to translate their numerical strength into political power. The explanation lies in a combination of the NFL's relationship to sections of the North American Labour Movement opposed to direct political action, divisions within the Newfoundland Labour Movement, and a set of political circumstances unique to Newfoundland. -- Although the NFL was a national labour central until Confederation with Canada in 1949, it was dominated by unions affiliated to the American Federation of Labour. The AFL's opposition to direct political action is well documented. However, in a country with strong ties to Great Britain the success of the British Labour Party provided an alternate model. Even so, there were only two serious attempts between 1937 and 1963 to emulate British practice. For the most part the NFL was less "political" than even the AFL. Initially this was because from 1933 to 1949 Newfoundland was governed by a commission of civil servants appointed by Britain. In a country without a system of electoral politics, direct political action did not seem a pressing concern. When electoral politics were restored and J.R. Smallwood became premier of Canada's tenth province, Smallwood granted the NFL almost every request it made for legislative reform. As a result the NFL saw no need to develop an independent political base in order to guarantee its influence with government. The fault with this approach was demonstrated during the IWA Strike of 1959. Smallwood suddenly turned against the Federation and without a political base of its own the NFL was powerless to protect the interests of Labour. Smallwood's subsequent attacks on the NFL sent it into a ten year period of decline; however, it is the thesis of this dissertation that the NFL's failure to give sufficient weight to the changed environment brought about by the return to electoral politics was as much the cause of its decline as any external factor.

This thesis deals with the working class of two advanced capitalist countries and focuses upon ideological conflict within working class organizations such as trade unions and political parties. The outcome of such conflicts within working class organizations is considered to be an expression of the state of working class consciousness at a given time. Within this broad context particular attention is paid to the ideology of social democracy which has been dominant in working class organizations in both countries during the modern period albeit to different degrees. The thesis uses a comparative approach and pays considerable attention to the interaction between the working class and its societal environment- the political economies of the two countries, the activities of the capitalist class and the impact of its ideology upon the working class. Using this approach the thesis deals with the emergence of social democracy as the hegemonic working class ideology, its main features particularly as they were developed in the post-war period, the emergence of possible contradictions between social democratic parties and ideology, and their working class supporters, and, utilizing an historical analysis of previous ideological shifts in working class organisations, the possibility of social democracy being superceded in its hegemonic role is considered. In dealing with such matters the issues of nationalization and incomes policies were judged to be especially salient and are discussed in some detail. In the course of this study theories which posited an end to ideological conflict in the advanced capitalist societies are considered and rejected. The past, present and future of social democracy, of ideological conflict, and of the working class itself, was found to be considerably more dynamic, complex and open to change than such theories had imagined.

Coal mining in nineteenth century British Columbia was confined almost exclusively to the tidewater coal measures of Vancouver Island where it was expanded rapidly from 1871 to 1891. This dissertation's purposes are to describe the coal industry's rise, account for its fast growth in the seventies and eighties, and assess the coal trade's general impact upon the region's economy. The approach is thematic, focusing in turn upon coal lands, capital, management, labour, technology, markets, production, and productivity. Standard research, organization, and interpretation methods for economic history are followed, including thorough descriptive use of statistical data. Comparisons are intensive and far-reaching, resulting in a close-knit framework upon which important conclusions are based. No effort has been made, however, to offer extensive biographical information on the coal trade's leading personalities. These studies confirm the coal industry's rapid expansion, and determine that all factors of production can explain that phenomenon with a high degree of certainty, though market demand and management technique do so more readily than other agents. It is shown that management methods and styles evolved quickly, the most effective being the owner-manager type as practiced by Robert Dunsmuir, the industry's most successful proprietor. Risk capital was drawn from various sources, including mainly British direct investments, local savings, partnerships (often involving foreign investors), and ploughed-back profits. Entrepreneurs and promoters were active in attempting to develop coal properties from 1864 on, though only those highly experienced in mining and management succeeded. Chronic worker shortages, coupled with the physical problems associated with coal mining in mountainous terrain, forced coal operators to opt early for labour saving technology imported almost exclusively from Britain. The introduction of large numbers of Oriental colliers by Dunsmuir after 1870, (who were willing to work at half the wages whites would), slowed the technological advance of the industry, but not annual rates of production increases. Considerable friction between white workers and management resulted from the latter's initiatives with Oriental labour, while the owners' policy of severely restricting wage-rates caused further serious labour problems, including a high number of work stoppages. Mine safety, job security, and general working conditions also were contentious issues. B.C.'s early collieries relied heavily upon the California market which often was unsteady, but which accounted for approximately seventy-five percent of all sales during the years 1849-91. Domestic users were mainly shipping companies, light industry, and households. Much of the local market was handled at the pithead. The major coal companies streamlined their channels of distribution by opening their own sales offices in Victoria and San Francisco, and. in the case of Dunsmuir, by also building a collier fleet and a railway of his own. The coal industry had a major influence upon southern Vancouver Island's economy, but not a large impact upon the remainder of the province. No determined "attempts were made by coal proprietors or other capitalists to create secondary industries linked to coal production, though colliery owners did invest in land, transport, and retail-wholesale ventures designed either to service their mining activities or to diversify their personal holdings. Such moves occurred later-on, however, as the main thrust of their initial efforts was to establish and maintain the coal trade with California.

A vital element in 'the transformation of Québec society during the period of "la révolution tranquille" was the establishment of a modern education system. As the government of Québec took initiatives to remodel education, the Corporation des Enseignants du Québec (CEQ), the provincial Association of Protestant Teachers (PAPT), and the Provincial Association of Catholic Teachers (PACT), became more involved in the mainstream of Québec education. The scope of the teachers' associations' actions evolved, they grew as organizations, and they emerged as militant unions in Québec's work force. While the teachers' associations worked in isolation from one another at the beginning of the ten-year period, there was movement towards greater cooperation in the mid-sixties and there were constant contacts during the latter part of the decade: these contacts involved significant cooperation but the associations were also in conflict over several issues. Cooperation among the associations was most highly developed in relation to economic and labour relations concerns. Serious conflict arose over the issues of language, school board reorganization and membership jurisdiction.

The 1919 sedition and deportation ammendments in Canada were not merely the product of anti-radical hysteria induced by the Winnipeg General Strike, but were consistent with the ideological propensity of the Conservative-Unionist and Bennett governments to suppress alien and left-wing dissent. This tendency was reflected in earlier, anti-radical enactments by Borden's government under the War Measures Act, providing, among other things, for the summary internment and deportation of suspected alien radicals. For the most part the stringent measures passed in 1919 represented the conversion of wartime powers to peace-time legislation. The conservative ideology that inspired these amendments was manifested in the vigorous application of deportation powers by immigration and other officials during the Red Scare of 1919-20 and the depression of the early thirties. It was further sustained by the stubborn refusal of the Conservative majority in the Senate to approve repeal legislation repeatedly passed by the House of Commons, even in the context of domestic stability in the 1920s. Ultimately, conservative reaction was superseded by liberalism in the form of civil liberties legislation passed by Mackenzie King's government. The emergence of the repeal of Section 98 of the Criminal Code as a major issue in the 1935 Dominion election and Bennett's corresponding defeat had demonstrated the Canadian public's desire that its governments address themselves, not to the suppression of radicalism, but to the solution of economic problems underpinning social unrest.

While realizing the necessity of being aware of the work of others, in order to get a reasonably adequate view of the events of May 1918 in Winnipeg, it has been necessary to make extensive use of primary sources, contemporary newspapers, interviews, and archival material. Wherever possible the information closest to the source has been used. Contemporary newspapers have been particularly valuable primary sources because they tended to report in depth about meetings, speeches, agreements, and announcements. Fortunately, by making comparisons with official documents, now available, it has been possible to verify that in general, newspaper reports were reasonably accurate. Except for the Telegram, most newspapers kept their news gathering function quite sharply separated from their editorial function. Interviews have been conducted with the realization that elderly people do not always remember the past as it really was. Their perceptions are, nevertheless, interesting...

Ideology determines how one experiences the world, shapes beliefs and expectations. Ideology is rooted in the structural dynamics of the social formation within which it exists. The articulation of the ideological with the economic structure can become problematic at certain points in time. This thesis uses a structural analysis to explore how changes in the economy have affected women in the Canadian labour force and how these changes related to the ideology surrounding women's work. Integral to this thesis is an analysis of how the State, through its labour policy, its government publications, and so on, does at times mediate between the economic situation and the dominant ideology as reflected in the popular media. This ideology is manifested through the institutional structure of the State as it influences both labour policy and the media.+ This thesis presents empirical data on the changes that took place in Canada between 1931 and 1956 in the ideology surrounding women's work. We take articles appearing in popular magazines and government publication of the era to be manifestations of the dominant ideology. We analyze materials in Maclean's, Chatelaine, Saturday Night, and the National Home Monthly. We analyzed government publications relating to labour policy; focussing on the Labour Gazette, and several reports and publications of government committees. The thesis begins with a theoretical outline. We discuss the concept of ideology and consider its role in the reproduction of class relations, the concept of a reserve army of labour, and finally, a brief summary of the concepts outlined above. We conclude the first chapter with a discussion of the methodologies used in our qualitative and quantitative analyses. The second, third and fourth chapters use qualitative analyses of periodicals to trace the articulation of the ideoloeical with the economic. Specific references are made to the media, to labour policy and to changes in the economy. These chapters deal with three distinct time periods -- with the Depression, with the World War Two years, and the period 1946 to 1956. In Chapter 5 we present a quantitative content analysis of selected magazines over the three periods. Our analyses of variations in the frequency of publications of articles relating to women's work and their activities both inside and outside the home confirm the shifts in emphasis over the period 1931 to 1956 that emerge from the earlier quantitative analyses. However, while the content and tone of articles does change with time, as is revealed in the qualitative analysis, the majority of articles have always related to traditionally domestic and feminine concerns. The data show an increasing professionalization of the housewife role. We conclude with a discussion of the importance of ideology in determining what is defined as women's work, and the importance of the control of women's labour market participation to the maintenance of the existing capitalist economic order.

The Mine Workers' Union of Canada was a trade union, centred in the coal fields of the Province of Alberta, which existed between the years 1925 and 1936, and included a membership of between 2,000 and 4,900 mine workers during that period. The formation of the union came about as a result of the break-up of District 18 of the United Mine Workers of America in 1924-1925. From the onset, its leadership was composed of differing elements, from conservatives who opposed the U.M.W. of A. for nationalistic reasons, to members of the Communist Party. The M.W.U.C. was one of the founding members of the All Canadian Congress of labour in 1927, and its President, Frank Wheatley, was a Vice-President of the Congress, until his ouster from the miners' union in 1930. miners' union in 1930. Early in that year the Communists, led by Harvey Murphy, began a drive to have the M.W.U.C. disaffiliate from the A.C.C.L., and join the new revolutionary trade union central, the Workers' Unity League. They were apparently successful, for in May of 1931, the union's membership voted by a 73% margin to affiliate with the W.U.L. Later that year the Communist Party of Canada was outlawed and the M.W.U.C. itself was declared to be an "unlawful association" in the courts. Anti-communist and anti-union sentiments on the part of employers led to long and bitter strikes, the most important of which took place in the Crows' Nest Pass in 1932. Finally, after six years of intense struggle on both the industrial and political fronts, the Workers Unity League was disbanded by the Communist Party. In June of 1936, the membership of the Mine Workers' Union of Canada voted to return to the U.M.W. of A. and the union passed into history.