AFL Executive Council Correspondence, Minutes, and Vote Books

The Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor is the governing body for the AFL. This collection contains early records of the AFL including correspondence, vote books, and minutes of the Executive Council during the years 1896 to 1954. The records are primarily bound scrapbooks with extreemly brittle pages.

The vote books have particular value in tracing the council's communications and decisions between its meetings, and in this respect they complement the minutes of the Executive Council. The vote books contain correspondence from Gompers [and John McBride, president 1894-1895] to members of the council, addressing specific issues upon which the council members then returned their votes.

This series represents the substantial majority of this collection. The vote books of the Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor trace the council's communications and decisions between its meetings; in this respect they compliment the minutes of the Executive Council. The vote books contain correspondence from Gompers (and John McBride, president 1894-1895) to members of the council, addressing specific issues upon which required no vote including, for example, the agenda for forthcoming council meetings. Typically, Gompers presented an issue in the letters, briefly sketched its background, framed the question on which council members were to vote, and enclosed copies of relevant documents.

At frequent intervals in the vote books are contemporary summaries of the council's votes. These detail each issue on which votes had been taken, indicate by a number which Gompers letter referred to the matter, and recapitulate the votes of the respective council members. See the external document for a partial index of these letters.

The vote books consist of large scrapbook volumes. AFL staff members attached the respective documents to the blank pages of these books with glue, staples, or paperclips, and later recorded the notes of the individual council members upon or alongside the letters. Two books are incomplete; they contained records dating from October 1913 to February 1914, and from April to August 1917.