political evolution.

Such, in brief, were the general business conditions of the
country and the issues which engaged the energies of labor
reformers during the period following the Civil War. Meanwhile
great changes were made in labor organizations. Many of the old
unions were reorganized, and numerous local amalgamations took
place. Most of the organizations now took the form of secret
societies whose initiations were marked with naive formalism and
whose routines were directed by a group of officers with royal
titles and fortified by signs, passwords, and ritual. Some of
these orders decorated the faithful with high-sounding degrees.
The societies adopted fantastic names such as "The Supreme
Mechanical Order of the Sun," "The Knights of St. Crispin," and
"The Noble Order of the Knights of Labor," of which more
presently.

Meanwhile, too, there was a growing desire to unify the workers
of the country by some sort of national organization. The outcome
was a notable Labor Congress held at Baltimore in August, 1866,
which included all kinds of labor organizations and was attended
by seventy-seven delegates from thirteen States. In the light of
subsequent events its resolutions now seem conservative and
constructive. This Congress believed that "all reforms in the
labor movement can only be effected by an intelligent, systematic
effort of the industrial classes . . . through the trades
organizations." Of strikes it declared that "they have been
injudicious and ill-advised, the result of impulse rather than
principle,...and we would therefore discountenance them
except as a dernier ressort, and when all means for an amicable