Aunt Sevvy, why does our church oppose labor unions?
6 November 2023 |
Dear Aunt Sevvy,
Why is the Adventist church against labor unions? They seem beneficial. What am I missing?
Signed, Curious non-Union worker
Dear Curious
People who categorically oppose organized labor don’t know history. At the dawn of the industrial era, big corporations were such a monopoly that they took terrible, even fatal, advantage of workers. It is hard for us now even to imagine how horribly miners, for example, were treated. Organized labor helped to end child labor, overly long work-weeks, starvation pay, unsafe conditions, and being remunerated in company scrip that ended in debt to the overpriced company store.
But the labor movement was hardly faultless: many Christians were understandably concerned about the violence and vandalism that accompanied strikes.
Ellen White admitted that “In the world gigantic monopolies will be formed.” Yet it wasn’t big business, but the workers’ response to which she most objected! “Men will bind themselves together in unions that will wrap them in the folds of the enemy,” she wrote.
Among her objections:
- It was a “confederacy with the world,” not unlike marrying someone outside your faith. Unions expected workers to act together, thus hindering their free choice. She wrote, “Trades unions will be formed, and those who refuse to join these unions will be marked men.” Though she doesn’t say it, she may have had Sabbath-keeping in mind
- She says that if unions caught on, it would be very difficult for the church’s institutions (where people were expected to work for sacrificial wages) to operate.
- She associates organized labor with cities, which she insisted wasn’t where Adventists should be. She wrote:
The turmoil and confusion that fill these cities, the conditions brought about by the labor unions and the strikes, would prove a great hindrance to our work. Men are seeking to bring those engaged in the different trades under bondage to certain unions. This is not God’s planning, but the planning of a power that we should in no wise acknowledge. God’s Word is fulfilling; the wicked are binding themselves up in bundles ready to be burned. {2SM 143.1}
Bottom line: the founders of our church were Yankee farmers and independent businessmen, while organized labor arose among immigrants in urban factories and remote coalfields, among Roman Catholic Irish, Italian, or Eastern Europeans workers. These were people Adventists didn’t ever seem comfortable with.
Over a century has passed since Ellen White gave her counsel. Not all unions are the same: some, such as nurses’ unions, are professional organizations that keep the profession safe for both patients and workers. Many win important concessions that benefit all workers. Aunty believes it is an oversimplification to condemn all such organizations just because they’re called “unions.” They must be evaluated by their fruits, just as individuals are.
Aunty also wonders this: what does it say about a worker who enjoys the benefits that his union has achieved, while refusing to join?
Aunt Sevvy
Aunt Sevvy has collected her answers into a book! You can get it from Amazon by clicking here.
You can write to Aunt Sevvy at DearAuntSevvy@gmail.com. Your real identity will never be revealed.
