ILGWU Research Department Records

The International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union was once one of the largest labor unions in the United States founded in 1900 by local union delegates representing about 2,000 members in cities in the northeastern United States. It was one of the first U.S. Unions to have a membership consisting of mostly females, and it played a key role in the labor history of the 1920s and 1930s. The union is generally referred to as the "ILGWU" or the "ILG". The ILGWU grew in geographical scope, membership size, and political influence to become one of the most powerful forces in American organized labor by mid-century. Representing workers in the women's garment industry, the ILGWU worked to improve working and living conditions of its members through collective bargaining agreements, training programs, health care facilities, cooperative housing, educational opportunities, and other efforts. The ILGWU merged with the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union in 1995 to form the Union of Needle trades, Industrial and Textile Employees (UNITE). UNITE merged with the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union (HERE) in 2004 to create a new union known as UNITE HERE. The two unions that formed UNITE in 1995 represented only 250,000 workers between them, down from the ILGWU's peak membership of 450,000 in 1969.

Formed in 1937, the Research Department of the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union (ILGWU) supported the administrative operations of the Union and coordinated the ILGWU's investigative operations. It provided union leaders with information on wages, working conditions, economic conditions, and other matters in the women's garment industry; analyzed information for the union; and monitored developments in the industry.



In addition to providing research for union leadership, Research Department staff prepared materials for Congressional testimony, presented cases on behalf of local unions to the War Labor Board, and worked to administer the Fair Labor Standards Act. At times, the director of the Research Department represented the ILGWU in national forums.



The Department also maintained an extensive library, collecting and housing documents from Union administrative staff that were deemed substantive and of lasting value to the Union, whether produced internally or externally. The information gathered by the Department was of particular value during labor disputes and contract negotiations.



Lazare Teper was the founding director of the ILGWU's Research Department, working in that position from 1937 to 1980. Born in Russia sometime between 1906 and 1908, Teper later studied at the University of Paris and earned his doctorate at Johns Hopkins University. He died in New York City in 1985.