Syndicat des Ouvriers Cordonniers (1903)

Attempting to track down information on the alleged first Haitian labor union is a trying enterprise. Unfortunately, the Syndicat des Ouvriers Cordonniers Haïtiens, which was founded on the 24th of March in 1903, does not appear in Le Nouvelliste. The main source used by Georges Fortuné, Michel Hector, and Edner Brutus for the union's existence is a report from Lamartine Cayemitte, at the first national congress of labor in Haiti in 1949. Cayemitte, a member of the organized shoemaker association, presumably described this early labor union from oral tradition, as passed down by the members of the union or the next generations of shoemakers. Based on Cayemitte, we know the union was founded at the shoe manufacturing workshop of a Dessources Poveda, and likely included 46 workers at the atelier. Discussing the union in the context of free syndicalism, Cayemitte appears to have blamed the government for interfering and putting an end to this first labor union plus subsequent attempts to organize shoemakers under Ernest Camille. Of course, it is not exactly a surprise shoemakers emerged as the first organized labor group in Haiti, since they had a penchant for being artisan intellectuals tied to radicalism in Europe and Latin America.

Unfortunately, a complete identification of Dessources Poveda has not been successful, although one source does mention a cordonnerie established by a Poveda of Cuban origins. Another Poveda of Cuban origins, Simon Poveda Ferrer, also appears in Port-au-Prince as part of a local affiliate of the Cuerpo de Consejo in the 1890s. Thus, it does appear that a cordonnerie owned by someone with the name Poveda did indeed exist in Port-au-Prince, and by 1903, it was large enough to employ at least 46 shoemakers. As indicated by Gaillard and others, the impact of Cuban immigrants on local industry and professions was significant, especially since they took on local apprentices and brought with them ideas associated with the Cuban labor movement of the era, as the appearance of worker associations in the late 19th century likely reflects. The further expansion of cordonneries like Tannerie Continentale, which employed even more shoemakers (plus tanners), were usually owned by foreigners and likely created the conditions where shoemakers were able to find solidarity through their loss of autonomy as the large-scale enterprises limited their opportunities to establish themselves as independent workers. Perhaps this is why, like cigarmakers in Cuba, shoemakers took early on to labor unions, as they saw their independent status as producers increasingly usurped by large workshops. And like the workers at Tannerie Continentale, the dissolution of the union occurred as the shoemakers walked out of the enterprise over an issue of salaries for a member of the union. 

Cayemitte also identified the members of the first committee of the union. Unfortunately, their names have not yet been found in my digging through some of the newspapers of the era, but their functions as presidents, treasurers, and secretaries suggests some members were literate and the union had a degree of organization or bureaucracy.  Perhaps this reflects the impact of mutual aid society structures and associations of the 1890s, or even the structure of labor unions and artisan associations as they appeared in the Dominican Republic or Jamaica at this time. Unfortunately, the union does not appear to have left any records, and their two deeds which should have garnered attention from the local press, a strike in 1905 and the sending of 500 dollars to the victims of an epidemic or catastrophe in Jamaica, do not appear in the pages of Le Nouvelliste (although it is possible other Port-au-Prince newspapers mentioned it). Indeed, the only mention of a Haitian labor organization and Jamaica in the pages of the newspaper refer to 10 gourdes sent by a worker association after the 1907 earthquake in Kingston. However, 500 dollars versus 10 gourdes clearly indicates a sizable difference in the revenue-raising capacities of the former syndicat and the latter association ouvrière. That the union could raise such a sum indicates it must have had some degree of organization and size.

It is probable that this short-lived experiment in Haitian syndicalism was not quite a labor union as we know it. Perhaps it was akin to the early artisan unions in Jamaica, which, according to Richard Hart, had members who emigrated to Haiti and elsewhere. Perhaps these Jamaican carpenters, tailors, shoemakers, etc. also brought some of their own interests to Haiti, hoping to protect the reputation of their skilled profession and regulate pay and apprenticeship. It may also be useful to look at the development of gremios and early labor organizations in the Dominican Republic, which included a Liga de Artesanos y Obreros that appeared in 1899. The organization conducted meetings in Santo Domingo and issued a challenge to capitalist classes that suggests a more heightened degree of class consciousness than perhaps anything in Jamaica or Haiti at the time.

According to Roberto Cassá, the Liga's manifesto was signed by workers from Spain and Puerto Rico, which might explain why the ephemeral league denounced capitalism and embraced a libertarian socialist view. Although there is no evidence that the Liga or Jose Dolores Alfonseca, the thinker who was associated with it, had any contact with Haiti, it may be possible that the Syndicat of shoemakers heard of or encountered news of the Dominican organization. Indeed, as urban workers with some degree of literacy, plus probably contact with foreign workers from Jamaica and Cuba, it is possible to speculate a possible degree of transnational flows of information. Indeed, during the US Occupation of the island, workers in Haiti and the DR apparently expressed an interest in the affairs of the other, looking to their mutual best interest, so perhaps there were ties before 1915/1916? This could of course be a function of the physical movement of workers themselves, but it is within the realm of possibility that news involving unions and mutual aid organizations in the Dominican part of the island reached Haiti.

If any of the above is useful at all, perhaps one can surmise that the first labor union in Haiti probably combined elements of a mutual aid organization with a labor union. It successfully organized shoemakers at the enterprise (although its unclear if every cordonnier was part of the union or only 46 out of an unknown number were unionized), survived for a number of years, and presumably brought some degree of security to the affiliated shoemakers. It was probably too ephemeral to have developed its own center and maybe lacked the patronage or association with a prominent middle-class professional or member of the elite to protect from the political pressures of Nord Alexis's presidency. If the voices of the workers at Tannerie Continentale provide any indication, the workers presumably saw themselves as the creators of wealth whose labor was necessary for the function of the workshop. Of course, one cannot say these workers were advancing any sort of socialist perspective, like the aforementioned Liga in the Dominican Republic, perhaps the syndicat was part of a larger wave of mutualist organizations, a wave of further associations of various sorts across different social classes, and changes in Port-au-Prince's urban landscape. Unfortunately, without any written sources from the union or about it, it's difficult to say to say much, but it probably reflects the convergence of mutualist and syndicalist organization in the Caribbean at the time. The context of Haitian nationalism would also be significant in terms of the Centennial of Haitian independence, in addition to the reformism of Firmin's supporters and possible ideological overlap with the Coeurs-Unis in Cap-Haiti.

Bibliography

Cassá, Roberto. 1990. Movimiento obrero y lucha socialista en la República Dominicana : (desde los orígenes hasta 1960). Santo Domingo: Fundación Cultural Dominicana.

Congrès national du travail. 1958. Actes du premier Congrès national du travail, 1er mai 1949. [Port-au-Prince?]: Impr. de l'état.

Cross, Malcolm, and Gad J. Heuman (editors). 1992. Labour in the Caribbean: from emancipation to independence. Basingstoke: Macmillan.

Fèquiére, Fleury. 1906. L'éducation haitienne. Port-au-Prince: Impr. de l'Abeille. 

Gaillard, Roger. 1984. La république exterminatrice ; P. 1. Une modernisatiion manquée: (1880-1896). Port-au-Prince: Autor.

Hector, Michel. 1989. Syndicalisme et socialisme en Haïti: 1932-1970. Port-au-Prince, Haïti: Impr. H. Deschamps.

Hobsbawm, E. J., and Joan Wallach Scott. "Political Shoemakers." Past & Present, no. 89 (1980): 86-114. 

Cœurs-Unis des Artisans

One of the most difficult aspects of tracing the early moments in Haitian labor history is reconstructing the origins of the Cœurs-Unis des Artisans. Mentioned by Michel Hector as an association founded in 1870, it grew and by the 1890s, expanded further to include artisans, intellectuals, and workers. Unfortunately, Hector's Syndicalisme et socialisme en Haïti: 1932-1970 does not examine the organization in detail. But, as an association of artisans founded in 1870, it would appear to resemble similar developments in Latin America and the Caribbean where artisans were also coming together in mutual aid societies or organizations. Other secondary sources that allude to Cœurs-Unis des Artisans include Laurent Dubois's Haiti: The Aftershocks of History,  Marc Péan's tomes on Cap-Haitien history, Luc-Joseph Pierre's Haïti: les origines du chaos and a chapter by Alex Bastien in Max Manigat's Cap-Haïtien : excursions dans le temps: au fil de nos souvenirs. Most of the secondary sources heavily rely on Marc Péan, who appears to be the sole historian to look in the archives and read some of the writings of Jules Auguste and other members of the association in Le Réveil, an important newspaper of the 1890s. 

Nonetheless, as the earliest known labor association (outside the rural world of Haiti and various forms of "peasant" associations), Cœurs-Unis merits further inquiry. Described by Luc-Joseph Pierre as a coterie of Freemasons who held meetings, processions, and banquets, which could not expand into a real movement during the zenith of firminisme, the association appears to be much more (Pierre 112). First of all, Cœurs-Unis was not a Masonic lodge, although several members were members of lodges, according to Alex Bastien (Bastien 27). Further, Bastien presents compelling evidence for Cœurs-Unis functioning as a mutual aid society and community institution. Its space served as a center for a chapel devoted to the Lady of Immaculate Conception, drawing worshipers and prayers from all social classes (Bastien 20). Moreover, Cœurs-Unis persisted well into the 20th century, and some of its later leadership (Jean Marquez Valbrun, an administrator of the association) lived long enough to impact Bastien and future generations. One of the usual functions of the group's local was a funeral salon, suggesting members saw it primarily as a mutual aid society for supporting similar artisans and laborers in the city (Bastien 27). 

Moreover, a plaque celebrating the centennial of the organization in 1970 describes its goal as "secours mutuels," indicating how the group's self-definition expressed mutualist aims (Bastien 26). However, Bastien's analysis of the group and its role in Cap-Haitien labor history is based on a much later incarnation of the organization. If one is searching for it's 19th century roots and ideology, only Péan becomes useful. Indeed, the three pivotal figures mentioned by Bastien were Etienne Leonce Bariento, Jean Marquez Valbrun, and Paul Emile Laguerre, none of whom appear in Péan's series on Cap-Haitien. However, their occupations give some sense of the reformist, progressive, and artisan base of the organization: Bariento was a lawyer, Laguerre a cabinetmaker (Bastien 18). Bastien also cites a book by Valbrun, which praised the labor solidarity of Cœurs-Unis des Artisans, presumably a value of the earlier moments in its foundation (Bastien 24). Sadly, Bastien does not cite any definitive proof of the organization involving itself in any labor conflicts, but he alludes to other possible mutualist acts of the organization.

In terms of the earlier development of Cœurs-Unis des Artisans, Péan's L'échec du firminisme comes closest to providing a full portrait. According to him, the organization was founded in 1870, after the civil wars of the Salnave years, to promote fraternity among Haitian artisans. This implies that Haitian shoemakers, tailors, etc. were already involved in the political affairs of the country, supporting one faction or another. However, Péan suggests that it was only in the 1880s when the organization became institutionalized through its monthly meetings, processions, banquets, and events (Péan 102). Péan additionally describes the conditions of industry and trades in the city of the late 19th century, but most learned a trade through an apprenticeship with a master artisan, including some who ran workshops of their own and were also members of Cœurs-Unis des Artisans, such as master-masons Godard Phaeton and Alcime Balthazar (Péan 103). Elsewhere, Péan names other members: William Dugue, Ocean Mompoint, Belotte, laywers like Jean Chrysostome Arteaud, the judge Cassius Daniel, intellectuals like Jules Auguste, and other artisans, such as Etienne Almajor. Péan claims most of the city's artisans were tied to Cœurs-Unis, but does not cite numbers or to what extent master artisans dominated the organization. 

Intriguingly, this mutualist organization survived for several decades, while the the Association Ouvriere in Port-au-Prince formed in July 1894 was short-lived. Even though Cœurs-Unis was suppressed during the failure of firminisme, since its members supported Firmin's message of reform, progress, and rational organization of finance and labor, somehow the organization continued to exist and exert a large influence on part of Cap-Haitien society. Perhaps the organization's longevity was due to the limited nature of industrialization in Cap-Haitien, where, despite the growth of a few small-scale industries employing between a dozen and 50 persons, the degree to which guild-like production faced challenges were limited (L'illusion héroïque: 25 ans de vie capoise, 1890-1915 describes in great detail changes in industry and the ideology of progress among would-be industrialists of the city) .

Thus, the organization did not seek to pursue unions or militant labor actions beyond mutualist concerns, since artisans and individual craft production faced fewer challenges there than in Port-au-Prince? Or perhaps the distance from the capital and the history of autonomy made it easier for artisans and workers to maintain a certain degree of independence in Cap-Haitien than in Port-au-Prince? Did the impact of Firminisme show an early example of labor and progressive politics coming together in Haiti for a social program? Why did the Coeurs-Unis not spread to the countryside? Were its members who received formal education or frequented the literary salons of the middle and upper classes sharing the same presumptions about the peasantry as the elite? To what extent did trade unions, class consciousness, or socialist ideology permeate the organization? The answer to these questions requires tackling the primary sources to move beyond conjecture.

1907 Cordonnier Walk Out and Urban Labor

Le Nouvelliste (September 20, 1907)

Although much remains to be done in tracking class formation and the conditions of urban labor in Haiti on the eve of the first US Occupation, this captures the voice of shoemakers in a large establishment in 1907 quite well. The establishment, Cordonnerie Continentale, was part of the Tannierie Continentale et Fabrique des Chaussures. An article from the International Bureau of the American Republics (1908) reported on this factory, based on US Consul John B. Terres. According to this report, the establishment employed a total of about 200 people, with a weekly output of 1500 pairs of shoes weekly, according to the Monthly Consular and Trade Reports. It also possessed a contract to supply the government with shoes for soldiers, was foreign-owned, imported most of the machinery, trimmings, and dyes from the US, and must be a great example of the few large-scale industrial workshops in Haiti at the time. 

However, this very same establishment experienced a strike in September 1907, as the shoemakers staged a walk-out when the owner, Marcou, accused them of stealing. Auguste Magloire wrote about visiting the site afterwards in Le Matin, and it would seem in 1907, Marcou was able to replace the strikers with new workers. According to the 1908 US Consul report, the business must have been doing well to employ 200 workers and enter into a contract with the government (although Magloire's visit would indicate about 80 workers in the shoe workshop area of the establishment). 

Nonetheless, the above notice, published in Le Nouvelliste, in the voice of the cordonniers themselves, indicates something, perhaps, of a nascent class consciousness. The workers express a sense of respect, dignity, and understanding of themselves as the ones who produce the shoes and oppose their alienation from the product of the labor. Indeed, a reference to slavery and their assertion of their intelligence and collaboration might indicate something beyond a mere camaraderie between workers in the same trade. Of course, more information must be located about this specific establishment and, if possible, the shoemakers employed there. Moreover, Ethéart (presumably Emmanuel), a lawyer affiliated with the Ecole Libre Professionnelle in the 1890s, would have had exposure to artisans and workers in Port-au-Prince. Thus, in spite of his name attached to the notice, it reads as if written by the shoemakers themselves, "pour les ouvriers."

Searching for An Embryonic Proletariat

Source 

A little project I've been obsessed with over the last few days is the question of the 'pre-proletariat' in Haiti, before the US Occupation. Although I am still waiting for access to a few sources (Pean, Gaillard, Corvington), I believe I can lay out a sketch of what I am trying to do here. Haitian Marxist historian Michel Hector has written about this "embryonic proletariat" and is my main source, but, unfortunately, he doesn't cite sources for some of his dates of early strikes in Haiti (in the 1890s and 1900s, among barbers, cordonniers, etc.). I am also struggling to find information about the Coeurs Unis des Artisans (founded in Cap-Haitien, in 1870, this organization of artisans and government functionaries persisted into the 1890s) and the Association Ouvrière (founded in July 1894, in Port-au-Prince), the only labor organizations I have come across for the 19th century. Regardless, here is a schematic overview of what I have been attempting to uncover.

Beginning in 1848 (or 1860, if one cites another essay by Hector published in a Mexican academic journal), assuming one agrees with Michel Hector's chronology, one sees the encroachment of foreign capital in Haiti (particularly in agriculture) and early attempts at improving industry, importing new technology, and a growing population of wage laborers. The period of 1804-1843, although including some plantations for sugar production (especially 1804-1820) and centers of local industry (such as hat production, in 1840s Port-au-Prince), Haiti did not attract significant foreign capital for new industries or agriculture.. Under Geffrard and successive presidents, attempts were made to improve productivity and attract foreign capital through concessions, educational reforms, public works projects, and imported technology (steam engines, cotton gins, coffee processing plants, soap factories, etc.) and new agricultural exports (cotton, for instance, was profitable in the Geffrard years). Unfortunately, state economic policies inhibited the growth of industry because of the growing dependence on foreign firms for imports, dependence on coffee exports, and trade policies which made it more difficult for Haitian industries to compete with Europe or the United States for various goods and products. In fact, Michel Hector cites a petition of Haitian artisans and workers to the government of Port-au-Prince, demanding a change in prices of consumer products and state support for Haitian-produced products, to which Edmond Paul, also responded. Paul, a proponent of industrialization and Haitian economic independence, certainly saw the need to support Haitian self-sufficiency and development in order to protect national independence. Under Salomon and successive governments, various expositions in Port-au-Prince and abroad (such as Chicago's 1893 fair) promoted Haitian industry, agriculture, and attempts at economic modernization. Both the Liberal and National parties were devoted to progress, agricultural improvements, and industry, at least rhetorically.

By the 1870s, Cubans, who were migrating through the circum-Caribbean region as a result of the Cuban Wars of independence, came to Port-au-Prince and other cities. Many were tailors, shoemakers, barbers, and small businessmen, who revitalized Haitian trade professions in urban areas, employed local workers, and were an important segment of the foreign population in Haiti in the late decades of the 19th century. Like the Cubans, Jamaicans and other migrants and artisans from the Caribbean and Europe also came to Haiti. Much of the skilled labor and specialized labor was performed by these foreign workers in Haiti, which may have inhibited or influenced early Haitian labor organization (assuming that many of these foreigners only passed through Haiti for a few years, and were mostly in urban areas). Thus, the Haitian 'working-class' of the second half of the 19th century was mostly based in skilled trades, and associated more with pre-industrial productivity and organization. In the rural areas, a growing number of people were working for commercial houses that exported coffee and other products, while others were employed in plantations, distilleries, refineries, and the coffee processing centers (which appear to have improved productivity and the quality of Haitian coffee beans for export, thereby spreading to other regions of the country). From going through various sources for the late 19th century and early 20th century, many of these ventures employed 50-100 laborers, and in some cases, more (including some urban workshops and factories as well as larger commercial firms preparing and processing export products). For example, Riviere's steamship company suppposedly employed 120 workers, according to an 1876 article in Les Bigailles. However, Hector's articles and essays which touch on this reveal that wages were low, and primary sources contradict each other on the availability of labor while many of these ventures did not survive for more than a few years. 

Regrettably, one must delve deeper into the newspapers, financial records, the National Bank of Haiti, and state records of the period to uncover specific informaton about the rural wage laborers of this time. For instance, how many were seasonal? Were the women trieuses of the Haitian coffee industry, such as those of Maison Vital, paid less than males who worked for these commercial houses and plantations? How many were paid in wages and in the demwatye system? How did the agrarian "pre-proletariat" relate to the "feudal" and peasant economies of the rural area? Did the landless poor and sharecropper of rural Haiti of the time begin to migrate to the cities, and if so, were any eventually employed in the new industries (such as cola factories, ice factories) or the cordonneries, cabinetmakers, tanneries, and other forms of employment? What about the educational reforms, such as the 1892 Ecole Libre Professionelle? Were skilled workers trained there, and if so, how many? What were labor relations like at Les Plantations d'Haiti, established in 1901, in Bayeux? According to various sources, this venture, founded with Belgian capital, employed perhaps 300 or more workers to grow sugar, rubber, bananas, and other products for export. Were labor relations "cordial" as some sources indicate? What about references to socialism and anarchism, which appear in 1890s and 1900s Haitian journals and texts? Or references to Anglo-Saxon/Latin dichotomies of labor and labor organization in Le Matin? Did provincial industries based on pre-industrial methods, such as the production of hats and pipes in Bainet, disappear with the rise of US capital in the 20th century? How many commercial firms were directly involved in growing coffee, cotton and other crops versus buying from speculateurs? Were the workers in the new hotels, cigarette and cigar factories, bakeries, foundries, and other ventures from the countryside or the peri-urban peripheral neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince? How did Haitian bourgeois capitalists compete with foreign firms and commercial houses also engaged in coffee, cotton, and similar ventures?

And what about labor strikes, organizations, mutual aid societies, guilds, radicalism and resistance? Hector cites Joseph Justin and Joseph Jeremie to demonstrate the non-existence of strikes, workers associations and unions in 19th century Haiti, but mentions strikes in the 1890s (barbers in Port-au-Prince, for example, in 1891) and early 1900s. The 1890s witnessed the formation of an Association Ouvriere, of a mutualist character (despite fears of socialism and anarchism among some in the Haitian political class). One of its leaders, Stanislas Madour, was involved with some of the Haitian artisanal products displayed at the 1893 Chicago Exposition, presumably since he was a cabinet-maker. Through Hector, one can locate a source for a 1905 strike of shoemakers, which was organized by a union (Syndicat des Ouvriers Cordonniers) founded in 1903 with 47 workers. This union, though small and ephemeral, even sent aid to Jamaican laborers after a natural catastrophe there, indicating an internationalist conception of labor solidarity. Of course, the non-peasant working population in Haiti remained small (one estimate I found indicated only 25,000 agricultural workers by 1915), but I am curious as to the social formation of the period as Haiti made the transition to global capitalism dominated by the United States. For example, were any of these aforementioned workers and artisans exposed to or influenced by Cuban worker and artisan radicalism or educational efforts, as indicated in the works of authors like Casanova, James, or Poyo? What else besides support political revolutions in Port-au-Prince did the urban/semi-urban popular classes accomplish? How did popular beliefs, Vodou, and different conceptions of labor and value shape worker-boss relations and resistance? What about the impact of class stratification in the Haitian countryside during this period (1860-1915)? How did the expansion of Port-au-Prince affect the semi-urban workers and unemployed in Bizoton and other districts? What about cooperatives, communal work projects, and gender relations? How did urban workers and artisans engaged in associations and the early unions of the 1900s differ from their rural counterparts?

As for sources, this work in progress has not pressured me to forming a proper bibliography. The works of Michel Hector have been the main source, as well as various 19th century and early 20th century commercial registries, consular reports, Haitian state documents, some newspapers, and contemporary Haitian texts and essays on education, labor, political econony, and industry. The Blue Book of Hayti, published during the US Occupation, is a priceless source for information on various firms that operated in Haiti in the late 1800s and early 1900s. In addition, it includes photographs of various offices, warehouses, and factories, as well as estimates on the number of employees and the commodities produced, processed, and exported. Pierre-Charles, Joachim, Dupuy, Trouillot, Jean Luc, Richman, Dubois, Plummer, Gaillard, and others have been useful secondary sources, although future references from Latortue, Corvington, Brisson, Redsons, Pean and additional newspapers shall be beneficial. Richman's oral history and archival research on Lacombe's land theft and HASCO in the Leogane plain is fascinating, but one wonders how representative it is of the ways in which Haitian landowners and foreign firms seized land from Haitian peasants in the second half of the 19th century and used the sharecropping system for production of coffee and sugar. One wonders to what extent the Simmond Brothers and other firms would have done what Lacombe did, who, since he lacked the capital and access to credit, persisted in using the sharecropping system to grow coffee and sugar. Perhaps, even before HASCO, wage laborers for agro-industrial companies were already experiencing dislocation and preferred to work outside of their communities, while their more fortunate counterparts persisted in the 'traditional' peasant economy. If the peasant moral economy was under threat already by Lacombe, and further weakened by the enroachment of HASCO, it would be interesting to see if this development was similar to that of other regions of Haiti, and in what manner agricultural workers may have responded similarly to other large-scale plantation developments and displacement.