Mexican Regional Labor Confederation (CROM)

The Confederación Regional de Obreros Mexicanos (CROM) was a powerful but short-lived labor organization that played an important role in the Mexican Revolution from 1918 to the late 1920s. Founded by Luis N. Morones, a former anarchist and electrical worker, the organization joined General Álvaro Obregón Salido in the political agitation that led to the overthrow of President Venustiano Carranza in 1920. During the presidency of Obregón, CROM expanded its membership, established a major political presence in Mexico City, and developed a close relationship with the American Federation of Labor in the United States, led by Samuel Gompers.

CROM reached the high point of its influence in the presidency of Plutarco Elías Calles. Morones was both leader of the union and minister of industry, labor, and commerce in the Calles cabinet. Although CROM's claim of 2 million members was inflated, the approximately 100,000 active members became a significant force in both unionization and politics. The Calles government, pressured by Morones, supported CROM against employers in the settlement of strikes and also favored CROM over other unions. At the end of Calles's term, CROM, which the intellectual and future labor leader Vicente Lombardo Toledano had joined, was the dominant union in the country. Still, the union faced competition from the independent Confederación General de Trabajadores (CGT), and despite the national leadership's power, militant CROM locals did act autonomously.

The assassination of Obregón in 1928, however, marked the beginning of a sudden decline for CROM and Morones, though the syndicate leader had opposed Obregón's bid for reelection. In the political uncertainty that followed, rival unions asserted themselves while the corrupt practices of Morones and his cronies discredited CROM. President Calles withdrew state support for the CROM and Morones. By the early 1930s, CROM was only a minor factor in Mexican labor and politics, replaced by the Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM).

See alsoCalles, Plutarco Elías; Mexico: Since 1910.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Marjorie Ruth Clark, Organized Labor in Mexico (1934, 1973).

Barry Carr, El movimiento obrero y la política en México, 1910–1929, 2 vols. (1976).

John M. Hart, Anarchism and the Mexican Working Class, 1860–1931 (1987).

Gregg Andrews, Shoulder to Shoulder? The American Federation of Labor, the United States, and the Mexican Revolution, 1910–1924 (1991).

Additional Bibliography

Basurto, Jorge. El proletariado industrial en México, 1850–1930. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, 1975.

Guadarrama, Rocío. Los sindicatos y la política en México: La CROM (1918–1928). Mexico: Ediciones Era, 1981.

Guajardo Elizondo, Horacio. Movimiento obrero mexicano. Mexico: Ediciones Gernika, 2001.

Lear, John. Workers, Neighbors, and Citizens: The Revolution in Mexico City. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001.

Leff Zimerman, Gloria. Los pactos obreros y la institucion presidencial en México, 1915–1938. Azcapotzalco, Mexico: Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana-Azcapotzalco, Seccion Editorial; and Mexico: Gernika, 1991.

Robles Gómez, Jorge Alfredo, and Luís Angel Gómez. De la autonomía al corporativismo: Memoria cronológica del movimiento obrero en México, 1900–1980. Mexico: El Atajo Ediciones, 1995.

Torres Parés, Javier. La revolución sin frontera: El Partido Liberal Mexicano y las relaciones entre el movimiento obrero de México y el de Estados Unidos, 1900–1923. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras: Ediciones y Distribuciones Hispánicas, 1990.

                                           John A. Britton