Michael Harter.
The Mechanics National Union is a North American labor union founded by Michael Harter in 1874. Harter was the head of the railroad yardmen's union, and he was able to bring together unions representing skilled tradesmen among the railroad, dockworkers, and steelworkers to form the M.N.U.
The M.N.U. had its origins in the formation of the Consolidated Engineering Fraternity by railroad engineers in 1857. Other skilled railroad workers then followed their lead, and were later joined by similar workers in the steel industry, including foremen, pourers, keymen, and mechanics. Skilled dockworkers such as loaders and warehouse managers did the same, as well as similar groups in other trades. In general, the M.N.U. bargained for higher wages, better working conditions for members, and a share of the profits for supervisory personnel. The union also favored laws restricting immigration, high tariffs, and stronger police forces to put down urban insurrections (which strongly suggests that the M.N.U. also included police unions). Although company managers resented the existence of the M.N.U., they found the union fairly easy to work with, and by 1880 the organizations of skilled workers had been incorporated into the industrial complex and the national government.
The economic hardships of the Great Depression of the 1880s had a great impact on the skilled workers of the M.N.U. Governor-General John McDowell's efforts to combat the depression, including loans to troubled industries by the National Financial Administration, won him the support of workers as well as management. In response, Carl Bok, the president of the M.N.U., announced that the union was setting aside its customary political neutrality to offer McDowell "the support of our members throughout our land, and this definitely extends to the political campaign of 1883." After McDowell's Liberal Party won full control of the Grand Council in 1883, the M.N.U. gained representation in the national government. However, following the Liberals' loss to the People's Coalition in the 1888 Grand Council elections, the M.N.U.'s place in the government was taken by the Consolidated Laborers Federation, a more radical organization of industrial unions that supported the P.C.
Sobel's source for the Mechanics National Union is Max Finnigan's Organizing the Elite: A History of the M.N.U. (New York, 1968).