Phil Penna was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 labor

Trade union

A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...

 leader, and president of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) from 1895 to 1896.

John McBride

John McBride

John McBride was an American labor union leader.McBride was born in Wayne County, Ohio, in 1854. He started working in the coal mines at the age of nine. In 1870, McBride joined the Ohio Miners' Union, and in 1883 he became its president—a post he retained until 1889...

, president of UMWA, had won election as president of the American Federation of Labor

American Federation of Labor

The American Federation of Labor was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States. It was founded in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions disaffected from the Knights of Labor, a national labor association. Samuel Gompers was elected president of the Federation at its...

 in 1895, unseating Samuel Gompers

Samuel Gompers

Samuel Gompers was an English-born American cigar maker who became a labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor , and served as that organization's president from 1886 to 1894 and from 1895 until his death in 1924...

. McBride resigned to take the position, and Penna was elected his successor.

The continuing Long Depression

Long Depression

The Long Depression was a worldwide economic crisis, felt most heavily in Europe and the United States, which had been experiencing strong economic growth fueled by the Second Industrial Revolution in the decade following the American Civil War. At the time, the episode was labeled the Great...

 severely depressed employment, wages and benefits for coal miners

Coal mining

The goal of coal mining is to obtain coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content, and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from iron ore and for cement production. In the United States,...

 during his tenure. McBride had led the Bituminous Coal Miners' Strike

Bituminous Coal Miners' Strike

no citation necessary - anhracite is not bituminous.e Bituminous Coal Miners' Strike was an unsuccessful national eight-week strike by miners of bituminous coal in the United States, which began on April 21, 1894....

—an unsuccessful eight-week national coal miners' strike—the year before Penna's presidency, which encouraged hundreds of non-union mines to flood the market for coal. During Penna's presidency, membership in the Mine Workers plummented from 13,000 to 9,700, and the union's treasury dropped from $2,600 to $600. Penna suspended union operations, stopped publishing the union newsletter and ceased paying per capita dues to the AFL.

Penna did not run for re-election. His successor was Michael Ratchford

Michael Ratchford

Michael Ratchford was an American labor leader and president of the United Mine Workers of America from 1897 to 1898....

.