International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers

The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) is a labor union that represents nearly 750,000 workers and retirees[1] in the electrical industry in the United States, Canada,[3] Panama,[4] Guam,[5][6] and several Caribbean island nations; particularly electricians, or inside wiremen, in the construction industry and lineworkers and other employees of public utilities. The union also represents some workers in the computer, telecommunications, broadcasting, and other fields related to electrical work.

IBEW
Full nameInternational Brotherhood of Electrical Workers
Founded1891
Members725,000 (2014)[1]
AffiliationAFL-CIO, CLC, NAMTU
Key peopleLonnie R. Stephenson, president[2]
Office locationWashington, DC
CountryUnited States, Canada,[3] Panama,[4] Guam[5][6] and Wake Island
Websitewww.ibew.org

Overview

It was founded in 1891, two years before George Westinghouse won the electric current wars by lighting the Chicago World's Columbian Exposition with alternating current, and before homes and businesses in the United States had begun receiving electricity. It is an international organization, based on the principle of collective bargaining. Its international president is Lonnie R. Stephenson and is affiliated with the AFL-CIO.

The beginnings of the IBEW were in the Electrical Wiremen and Linemen's Union No. 5221, founded in St. Louis, Missouri in 1890.[7][8] By 1891, after sufficient interest was shown in a national union, a convention was held on November 21, 1891 in St. Louis. At the convention, the IBEW, then known as the National Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (NBEW), was officially formed. The American Federation of Labor gave the NBEW a charter as an AFL affiliate on December 7, 1891. The union's official journal, The Electrical Worker, was first published on January 15, 1893, and has been published ever since. At the 1899 convention in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the union's name was officially changed to the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

The union went through lean times in its early years, then struggled through six years of schism during the 1910s, when two rival groups each claimed to be the duly elected leaders of the union. In 1919, as many employers were trying to drive unions out of the workplace through a national open shop campaign, the union agreed to form the Council on Industrial Relations, a bipartite body made up of equal numbers of management and union representatives with the power to resolve any collective bargaining disputes. That body still functions today, and has largely resolved strikes in the IBEW's jurisdiction in the construction industry.

In September 1941, the National Apprenticeship Standards for the Electrical Construction Industry, a joint effort among the IBEW, the National Electrical Contractors Association, and the Federal Committee on Apprenticeship, were established. The IBEW added additional training programs and courses as needed to keep up with new technologies, including an industrial electronics course in 1959 and an industrial nuclear power course in 1966.

Today, the IBEW conducts apprenticeship programs for electricians, linemen, and VDV (voice, data, and video) installers (who install low-voltage wiring such as computer networks), in conjunction with the National Electrical Contractors Association, under the auspices of the National Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee (NJATC), which allows apprentices to "earn while you learn." In Canadian jurisdictions, the IBEW does not deliver apprenticeship training, but does conduct supplemental training for government trained apprentices and journeypersons, often at little or no cost to its members. The IBEW local 353 Toronto requires all apprentices to be registered with the JAC (Joint Apprenticeship Council) for a number of safety courses, pre-apprenticeship training, pre-trade school courses, supplementary training, and pre-exam courses.

The IBEW's membership peaked in 1972 at approximately 1 million members. The membership numbers were in a slow decline throughout the rest of the 1970s and the 1980s, but have since stabilized. One major loss of membership for the IBEW came about because of the court-ordered breakup at the end of 1982 of AT&T, where the IBEW was heavily organized among both telephone workers and in AT&T's manufacturing facilities. Membership as of 2013 stands at about 750,000, according to their official website.

List of International Presidents
IBEW obligation at Local 405 hall in Cedar Rapids, Iowa
  • Henry Miller (1891–1893)
  • Queren Jansen (1893–1894)
  • H. W. Sherman (1894–1897)
  • J. H. Maloney (1897–1899)
  • Thomas Wheeler (1899–1901)
  • W. A. Jackson (1901–1903)
  • Frank Joseph McNulty (1903–1919) – first full-time, paid president of the union; elected at Salt Lake City Conference in 1903, retired at New Orleans Conference in 1919
  • James Patrick Noonan (acting president, 1917, president 1919–1929) – died in office
  • Henry H. Broach (1929–1933)
  • Daniel (Dan) W. Tracy (1933–1940)
  • Edward J. Brown (1940–1947)
  • Daniel (Dan) W. Tracy (1947–1954)
  • J. Scott Milne (1954–1955)
  • Gordon M. Freeman (1955–1968)
  • Charles H. Pillard (1968–1986)
  • John Joseph (Jack) Barry (1986–2001)
  • Edwin D. (Ed) Hill (2001–2015)
  • Lonnie R. Stephenson (2015–present)

List of IBEW Conventions

[9][10]

#LocationDate
1St. Louis, MissouriNovember 1891
2Chicago, IllinoisNovember 1892
3New York City, New YorkNovember 1910
4Washington D.C.November 1895
5Detroit, MichiganNovember 1897
6Pittsburgh, PennsylvaniaOctober 1899
7St. Louis, MissouriOctober 1901
8Salt Lake City, UtahSeptember 1903
9Louisville, KentuckySeptember 1905
10Chicago, IllinoisSept./ Oct. 1909
11Rochester, New YorkSeptember 1911
12Boston, MassachusettsSeptember 1913
13St. Paul, MinnesotaSept./ Oct. 1915
14Atlantic City, New JerseySeptember 1917
15New Orleans, LouisianaSeptember 1919
16St. Louis, MissouriSept./ Oct. 1921
17Montreal, QuebecAugust 1923
18Seattle, WashingtonAugust 1925
19Detroit, MichiganAugust 1927
20Miami, FloridaSeptember 1929
21St. Louis, MissouriOctober 1941
22San Francisco, CaliforniaSeptember 1946
23Atlantic City, New JerseySeptember 1948
24Miami, FloridaOctober 1950
25Chicago, IllinoisAug./ Sept. 1954
26Cleveland, OhioSept./ Oct. 1958
27Montreal, QuebecSeptember 1962
28St. Louis, MissouriSeptember 1966
29Seattle, WashingtonSept./ Oct. 1970
30Kansas City, MissouriSeptember 1974
31Atlantic City, New JerseyOctober 1978
32Los Angeles, CaliforniaSeptember 1982
33Toronto, OntarioSeptember 1986
34St. Louis, MissouriOctober 1991
35Philadelphia, PennsylvaniaSeptember 1996
36San Francisco, CaliforniaSeptember 2001
37Cleveland, OhioSeptember 2006
38Vancouver, British ColumbiaSeptember 2011
39St. Louis, MissouriSeptember 2016
40Chicago, IllinoisSeptember 2021
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References
  1. "Who We Are". ibew.org. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. n.d. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  2. "IEC ppoints Lonnie Stephenson International President". ibew.org. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. July 2015. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  3. "IBEW Canada - The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers". ibewcanada.ca. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. n.d. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  4. "Panama, IBEW Sign Training Agreement for Panama Canal Expansion". ibew.org. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. June 2009. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  5. "Hawaii Local Bridges Pacific with Guam Expansion". ibew.org. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. March 2012. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  6. "Local 1260 Reaches Guam Raytheon Agreement". ibew.org. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. October 2002. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  7. Palladino, Grace (1991). Dreams of Dignity, Workers of Vision. Washington D.C.: International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
  8. "Hazards of the Electrical Occupation". Electrical Review and Western Electrician. 54 (3): 122.
  9. National Joint Apprenticeship and Training committee for the Electrical Industry. Student Orientation Workbook. Upper Marlboro, MD: NJATC, 2005. Book. Page 193
  10. "38th International Convenetion - Brotherhood Beyond Borders". ibew.org. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. n.d. Retrieved November 17, 2017.

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