(Noble Order of Knights of Labor), a mass organization of American workers in the last third of the 19th century. It played an important role in the development of the labor movement in the United States.
Founded in 1869 by a group of garment workers headed by Uriah Stevens, it operated as a secret organization until 1878. The Knights of Labor represented the first attempt to organize the American working class on a national scale. It brought together workers from various trades, particularly the unskilled, and also included nonproletarian and petit bourgeois elements. The organization pursued limited goals, such as creation of producers’ cooperatives and mutual aid societies and struggle for “fair” labor conditions. As a secret order, it had complex ceremonies and rituals.
The assumption of an open, legal status helped the Knights of Labor transform itself into the most influential labor organization in the United States. Its approximately 10,000 members in 1879 grew to more than 700,000 in 1886. The Knights of Labor led a number of successful strikes during this period. However, its influence and size declined after 1886, when its leaders turned away from the class struggle. In 1893 it had only around 70,000 members and by the end of the century had virtually ceased to exist.